


i am easy to find

by zach_stone



Series: i am easy to find 'verse [1]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, But different, Eddie Kaspbrak Lives, Fix-It, Getting Together, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Pennywise DOES exist in this AU and Chapter 2 events will happen, Period-Typical Homophobia, Repressed Memories, Stanley Uris Lives, now THERE'S a tag we should all be using more
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-15
Updated: 2019-11-10
Packaged: 2020-12-16 14:17:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 47,202
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21037583
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zach_stone/pseuds/zach_stone
Summary: Richie grabs the edge of the polaroid and slides it out from underneath the comic books. It’s a picture of a group of kids, all sitting on a porch in someone’s backyard. He recognizes his tween self pretty quickly — stupid hair, enormous glasses that made him look constantly bug-eyed. He’s really hamming it up for the camera, grinning with his arm slung around some dark-haired kid with a cast on his arm. He can’t remember who the kid is, who any of these kids are, but the way they’re all huddled together and smiling like they really give a shit about each other… he doesn’t remember ever having friends like this.“Who the fuckareyou,” he whispers at the kids in the picture. He flips it over, and sees his own childish chicken-scratch handwriting on the back.Bill, Bev, Ben, Eddie, ME!, Stan, & Mike. September 1989!--Or, 25-year-old Richie Tozier doesn't know why he can't remember his childhood, or why he has nightmares about yellow eyes looming in the dark. Then he finds an old photo of friends he can't remember, and things start to change. A "what if Richie and Eddie found each other again during the 27 years" fic.





	1. PART ONE: Memories

**Author's Note:**

> this fic is. well. it's going to be a doozy, i think. i have 3 parts planned, and this is potentially the shortest of the three. we'll just see how it goes. this is an AU that will, eventually, get around to the pennywise stuff and the events of chapter 2, but many things will change to get us there. 
> 
> an important note: while i was indeed alive in the early 2000s, i was also, like, in grade school, so any mention of technology and shit is based on foggy memories and google. if something isn't quite accurate, don't @ me. we're here to have fun.
> 
> content warning in this first chapter for some vomiting. richie pukes like 4 times. listen, it's not my fault andy muschietti made that a character trait for him, ok.

_ Something's leaving me behind _

_ It's just a feeling in my mind _

_ What was it you always said? _

_ We're connected by a thread _

_ If we're ever far apart _

_ I'll still feel the pull of you _

_ – The National, “The Pull Of You” _

** _ November 2001 _ **

The lights in the bar are dim and hazy enough that the patrons’ faces are obscured from the vantage point of the tiny stage in the back corner. This is precisely why Richie likes it — the whole place looks kind of dreamlike, and he can settle into his Showtime Self and give it his all. If he can’t see if anyone’s actually listening, he can just pretend they all are. 

He’s onstage for fifteen minutes, his longest comedy set to date, and he gets a few chuckles and one outright, drunken guffaw, which is encouraging. When he says “thank you” into the mic and places it back in the stand, no one applauds, but no one ever really applauds the comics here. Richie doesn’t take it personally. He sticks his hands in his pockets and meanders over to the bar, where Marco, the owner, is cleaning a glass and giving him an appraising look.

“Not bad, right?” Richie says, dropping onto a stool using his feet to swivel the seat back and forth. “I’m halfway to a half hour set!”

“It’s… getting there,” Marco says. He sets the glass down on the counter and gestures to it. “You gonna order something?”

Richie shakes his head sheepishly. “I’m fuckin’ broke, man. Radio doesn’t pay shit.”

“Offer still stands if you wanna tend bar,” Marco says. He grabs a bottle of bourbon from under the counter and pours it over ice before sliding it to Richie. “I’ll put it on your tab,” he adds, when Richie opens his mouth to protest. “Call it a celebration that you’re halfway to a half hour, or whatever.” 

Richie ducks his head, grinning, and takes the glass. “Cheers to that, my man.” 

Marco’s offered Richie a bartending job on a regular basis for the past year and a half since he’s started coming here on standup nights, and realistically, Richie knows he should just take the fucking job — interning at a radio station isn’t exactly lining his wallet. But it’s the _ principle _of the thing: he moved to Los Angeles for college with a lofty plan of making it big in radio, and then standup. When his mother fretted about his finances, he’d waved her off, saying he’d be making bank with his name up in lights within a year. He’s been here seven years without so much as a whisper of a promotion at the radio station in the last three, and bouncing around bars that have “comedy nights” has gotten him nothing but a few canned responses to hecklers that he’s saving for whenever he finally gets an audience. 

It’s not for lack of trying, because Richie thinks he’s trying harder at this than he’s tried at anything in his life — definitely more than he tried in college, where he scooted by under the radar with a straight B average. The trouble is, Richie feels like his brain is a little… _ distracted _ sometimes. Like there’s something in the back of his mind that he can’t quite access. An itch, a tickle. Or maybe he just has fucking ADHD, that’s what his college friends seemed to think. They’re probably not wrong, but it feels like _ more _than that, not that he’s ever been able to explain it to anyone. 

The tickle bothers him less when he’s drunk, so he takes advantage of Marco’s generosity and has three more glasses of bourbon before he calls it a night and staggers the five blocks home. He shares a house with four other guys, all in their twenties and trying to “make it big” in Hollywood, and they almost never see each other. That’s just fine by Richie — he’s not big on friends. He tells himself this is a choice, and not a personal flaw, that he’s not able to get close to anyone. He thinks maybe he’s always been this way. He can’t remember ever really being very close to anyone, even when he was growing up. Most of his childhood before high school is a bit of a blur, which he can only assume means it was boring and lonely as shit. 

He falls asleep face-first on his bed with his mouth tasting like booze. 

He barely manages to get to the radio station on time the next morning, scrambling in with his hair a mess and his mouth still vaguely boozy. He’s not exactly hungover, but he can tell Al takes one look at him and knows exactly why he’s a mess that morning. 

“Tozier,” Al says, like it pains him. “There’s a stack of tapes for this afternoon’s mix, I need you to go through and label them. They’re on your desk.”

“Right-o!” Richie says. Al makes the face he always makes when Richie does a Voice, which is the most impressive combination of a wince and a scowl that Richie’s ever seen. Clearly, his boss is not in the best mood, but he rarely is. Richie’s been working as a barely-paid intern at the station for three years and he doesn’t think he’s ever so much as gotten Al to crack a smile. 

But Richie’s come into work with a _ mission, _ and whether or not it’s wise, he barrels ahead. “So, Al… did you think any more about that segment I pitched to you the other day?”

Al sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “Rich, I don’t pay you to pitch me segments.”

“Well, actually, according to the job description when I applied, my role is to ‘assist the station in any area possible,’ so if you _ think _about it —”

“Goddamn it, Rich, just go label the fucking tapes,” Al snaps. “I don’t want to hear another word about your fucking — _ ’80s night, _ it’s not happening.” He throws his hands up and leaves the room. Richie watches him go with a sour feeling settling in his stomach. He makes a face at his boss’s retreating back, which makes him feel a little bit better, and then shuffles over to his desk to stare down at the box of tapes sitting there. 

“The fun never ends,” he mutters, and gets to work. 

Sometimes, Richie has nightmares. Which, okay, everyone has fucking nightmares, but these are _ real _ doozies. He’s had them as far back as he can remember, and they’re almost always the same. Some variation on a persistent theme: it is dark, it is damp, and he is more scared than he’s ever been in his life. Sometimes, yellow eyes loom out of the dark. Sometimes, a clawed hand reaches for his face. Sometimes, he is crying, and always, he is alone. Usually, when he wakes up that’s about all he can remember — just those flashes of sensation and imagery and pure, blood-chilling terror. But every once in a while, he can remember a little bit more. Like the voice, the one that speaks to him low and soft and _ evil. _

_ “Want a kiss, Richie?” _ it says sometimes, from a giant, broken mouth full of jagged, wooden teeth. And other times: _ “I know what you’re hiding. Wouldn’t want them all to know, would you, Richie?” _while those eyes pierce right through the center of his chest and into his cowardly heart.

He wakes up feeling haunted and awful, and usually sweaty like he’s been sick and his fever just broke. When he was younger, fourteen or fifteen, and first started having the dreams, he’d tell his parents about them. He stopped when he realized that their platitudes did nothing to soothe his fear. Especially when he couldn’t tell them everything, what the voice _ says _or the truth about why it’s so fucking terrifying. 

For a brief period he entertained the idea of writing jokes about the dreams — that’s a thing comics do, right, process their fucked-up brains through humor — but he’s never quite found a way to spin “sometimes I dream that a monster who is also a clown calls me a homo” into something relatable. So he tucks that all away behind the Voices and the I’m-Just-Fine, Fast-Talking-Tozier image he’s been meticulously perfecting since high school. His freshman year of college there was a girl in his dorm who said that he did the Voices because he was afraid of letting people in. To which Richie replied, _ actually, Monica, I do Voices because they’re fucking hilarious, _ and then he made a vow never to talk to a psych major again.

Like the tickle in the back of his mind, it feels like he’s missing something, like there’s context he can’t quite get a handle on that would explain everything. He tells himself he doesn’t care, that everyone’s got repression and night terrors, and when he’s wildly famous he can shell out the big bucks for a shrink.

It’s a pretty average day in late November: he’s woken up from a particularly rough one of the nightmares, shuddering at the sense memory of monster drool falling on his face, and goes through the motions at work before heading to Marco’s bar for another open mic night. He peers at his reflection in the window glass before he goes inside: his hair is getting pretty long, his glasses make his eyes look slightly magnified, and the T-shirt he’s wearing is wrinkled enough that even _ he’s _ a little embarrassed by it. But whatever, he’s worked his way up to eighteen minutes now, and he’s got a _ good _feeling about the last three. 

When he ducks into the bar, there’s someone on the little stage already, doing something stupid with a ventriloquist dummy. Richie had once entertained the notion of ventriloquism, but he was astonishingly bad at it, and gave that shit up pretty fast. He walks over to the bar, where Marco is fixing a couple of girls some cocktails. Richie sits down to wait, scanning the bar for the usual open mic sign-up sheet, but he doesn’t see it anywhere. When Marco spots him, a weird expression briefly crosses his face before he wanders over. 

“Hey, Rich,” Marco says. “The usual?”

“Where’s the sign-up sheet?” Richie asks. “I’ve got a new closer, man, it’s gonna bring the house down.” 

Marco winces. “Sorry, buddy, it’s all filled up already.”

Richie’s eyebrows shoot up. In all the time he’s been coming to the bar, the open mic slots have never been entirely filled. “Oh,” he says, aiming for an unaffected tone of voice. “That’s — well, that’s fine. I guess I’ll just… get a beer, watch the other hacks try to make it up there, right?”

Marco smiles at him, but he’s still looking kind of weird, and Richie can’t figure out why. He gets his beer and drinks it too quickly while the guy onstage makes the ventriloquist dummy say a joke about “morning wood.” 

Richie doesn’t mean to, but he gets pretty astonishingly drunk as the night goes on. He’s never sat around the bar this long without the anticipation of doing his set, so he finds himself waving a hand for a refill way more often than usual. He’s well on his way to plastered when he notices, from the other end of the bar, that a couple of people are talking to Marco, who has a clipboard out and is passing them a pen to write down their names. The fucking sign-up sheet. 

Richie staggers to his feet and goes over to them, pointing at Marco and practically shouting, “Hey, what the fuck, man?” 

Marco whips around to look at him. “Rich, calm down bud, it’s not what you think.”

“Why the fuck did you tell me there was no room on the sign-up sheet? Who the hell are these people, fuckin’ VIP guests?” Richie demands, gesturing to the two guys who’d just put their names on the sheet. They’re both staring at him with a mixture of alarm and irritation. 

“Richie, listen to me,” Marco says, lowering his voice. “There are agents here tonight, alright, they’re scoping out the performers, and I — I care about you, Rich, I know this is your dream, but you’re just not. You’re not _ there _yet, and I didn’t want you to embarrass yourself —”

“Oh, _ fuck you, _ Marco,” Richie snaps. His head is pounding. He feels miserable with humiliation. “Fuck you! Why’s it your fucking decision if I embarrass myself? And fuck you, too!” he adds, turning to the two dudes who are _ still fucking standing there, _just staring at him. “What the fuck kinda talent are you numbnuts bringing to the stage, huh?”

“Hey, fuck off, dude,” the closer guy says. He’s shorter than Richie, but broad, and he looks like he actually works out and eats more than just Spaghettios and Hamburger Helper every day of his life. If Richie were a fraction more sober, he would back the hell off right now, slink away to a corner table at the bar and nurse a few glasses of water until he felt up for walking home to deal with his embarrassment in peace. 

But he’s a little too far gone for the minimal self preservation he usually has, so instead Richie gets right up in the guy’s face and shoves him. “You fuck off,” he says. 

“Rich, cut it out,” Marco says warningly, just as the other guy shoves Richie back, sending him sprawling against the barstools and barely catching himself from falling on his ass. “Hey! Take this shit outside!” Marco yells. 

Richie gets his feet under him again and lunges like he’s going to deck the guy, but his hand-eye coordination is all messed up so he misses by a wide margin, leaving himself fully open for the fist that collides with his face. 

“Fuck!” Richie yells, falling on the floor and clutching his hands to his face. His glasses are broken, hanging crookedly from his nose, and his right eye is throbbing and tearing up enough that he can’t see out of it. 

“Alright, that’s enough, get out,” Marco says, coming out from behind the bar to chase the two dudes out of the building. He leans down to hoist Richie to his feet. “Rich, Jesus Christ, man, what are you doing?”

“Don’t fuckin’ touch me,” Richie mutters, jerking his arm out of Marco’s grasp. “I’m going home. Screw you, man, for real.”

“Let me call you a cab or something,” Marco says. Richie waves him off, shoves open the door and stumbles his way home. It’s probably a miracle he’s not mugged, but at this point he wouldn’t even care. He barely makes it to the bathroom before he throws up, and then he sits on the floor with his cheek resting against the cool porcelain of the toilet seat. He lets himself cry a few humiliated tears and wonders if he’s ever going to be able to face going into the bar again. The right side of his face throbs.

“Is this rock bottom?” Richie asks no one in particular. “Jesus, it better be. I don’t want to know what’s lower than this shit.” 

He falls asleep in the bathroom and wakes up around noon the next day by one of his roommates yelling when they open the door and stumble upon him. Richie calls in sick to work and gets chewed out by Al for like twenty minutes, and then he takes four ibuprofen and goes to bed. 

Richie is awoken some hours later, well into the afternoon, by the phone ringing downstairs. He groans, rolling himself out of bed and fumbling for his glasses before remembering they’re busted. He has a spare pair in a drawer somewhere, but he can’t be bothered to find them, so he staggers somewhat blindly into the living room and picks up the phone.

“Hello?” he mumbles.

“Hi, this is Maggie Tozier. Richie, is that you?”

“Mom?” Richie squints at the clock across the room, but he can’t make out anything more than a blur. “Yeah, it’s me. What’s up?”

“Oh good, I was hoping you’d be home from work. Listen, honey, I know you’re set on staying in LA —”

“Mom,” Richie groans. His parents have been trying to convince him to move back to New York ever since he left for college. The Toziers moved there when Richie was fourteen, and he barely remembers the small town in Maine he grew up in before that, so he considers the Big Apple “home” even though he only lived there for four years. Still, he hasn’t been back much, besides the occasional holiday. “Not this again, okay, I have a job here in the industry and everything.”

“So you keep saying,” Maggie says. There’s a sort of smile in her voice. “That’s what I’m calling about, actually. I know you’ve been waiting on a promotion at the radio station for years, honey, and if you’re really set on that place I won’t push the issue, but your dad — he pulled some strings with a friend of his from college, and he’s got a job interview for you.”

“Well I appreciate it, but I don’t really see a future for myself in dentistry. I don’t even floss.”

“Don’t let your dad hear you say that,” Maggie says. “Not a dentist job, Richie, a radio job. There’s a station here looking for a new co-host for a late-night broadcast, and they want to meet you.”

Richie presses a hand against his forehead, trying to will the hangover away so he can think. “I — did you say _ co-host? _As in, I’d be on the air?” 

“Uh-huh,” Maggie says. She’s definitely smiling, Richie can just hear it. 

“Shit,” Richie says, and then laughs. “Holy shit, mom!”

“Language,” she chides. “What do you think, honey? Next Thursday? We can send you money for the flight —”

“Yes!” Richie cuts her off. “Oh my god, mom, _ yeah _ I’ll come do an interview for a fucking _ co-host _gig, holy shit! Sorry, I know, language,” he adds. 

She gives him the details and he promises to call her once he’s found a flight, and then he hangs up and stares dazedly into space for a moment. “Not a bad comeback from rock bottom, Tozier,” he says to himself. Then he lurches to the bathroom to puke again.

A week later he finds himself in a taxi, pulling up to his parents’ brownstone in New York. He’s got a duffle bag in the seat next to him that contains the one nice shirt and pair of slacks he owns, at his mother’s insistence. He tips the cabbie and gets out of the car, bounding up the steps to the home he’d spent a comparatively short amount of time in. He’s been in California longer than he was ever here, he realizes. 

He knocks on the door, and a moment later it opens and there’s his mom, standing there with open arms and her familiar face, a little more lined than he remembers it. Her hair is greyer, too, he notices when he bends over so she can hug him tightly. 

“How was your flight?” she asks, stepping aside so he can come in. 

“Flights, plural,” he reminds her. “The layover was in fucking _ Houston, _you know I hate the Houston airport.”

“Language,” his mother chides. She takes his duffle from him and sets it on the floor, reaching up so she can take his face in her hands. “Let me take a look at my little man.”

_ “Mom,” _ he says, rolling his eyes. 

Her thumb brushes under the discolored skin below his right eye, and he flinches involuntarily. “Is that a black eye?” she demands. “Richie…”

He sighs. The bruising has mostly faded by now, just a smudge of sickly green just below his eye and a little bit of red discoloration around that. “It’s — it’s nothing, I just tripped.”

She frowns at him. “Sure, into someone’s fist.” She clucks her tongue. “You’d better not let your dad see that, you know how he feels about you getting into fights.”

“Okay, I’ll just approach him from the left side only,” Richie deadpans. “It’s _ fine, _mom, quit fussing.” 

“Your hair’s getting long,” she says then, combing her fingers through it. “Are you trying to look like a surfer dude?”

Richie laughs. “Don’t ever say ‘dude’ again, oh my god. No, I’m not.”

Maggie smiles. “Maybe we should give it a trim before the interview tomorrow, hm? I’ve got the kitchen scissors ready to go.”

“I like my hair like this,” Richie insists. “Anyway, it doesn’t matter what my hair looks like, no one’s gonna see me on the radio.” He grins. “Dad always said I had the face for it.”

“Oh, don’t say that, Rich, you’re very handsome,” Maggie says. She pats his cheek and finally releases him. “Well, you can take your stuff up to your old room. Oh! That reminds me. I put a box of your old things in there, it was in the storage closet. Would you sort through it and see if there’s anything you want to keep? We’re trying to declutter.”

“Yeah, sure,” Richie says. He shoulders his duffle again and heads up the stairs. 

It’s strange, being home again. He hasn’t been here since January, and nothing much has changed. His mom makes dinner while he sits at the kitchen table and tells her highly edited accounts of how things are going at work. He carefully avoids mentioning the open mic nights — his bruised eye socket still twinges when he thinks about it.

When Wentworth Tozier breezes into the house around 7:30, Maggie already has Richie tasked with setting the table. Went drops his briefcase in the living room and comes into the kitchen, clapping Richie so hard on the shoulder that Richie nearly drops the casserole dish he’s holding.

“How ya doing, Rich?” Went says. Richie places the dish on the trivet before turning to give his dad a hug. “Got any new ones for me?” Went adds.

Richie knows exactly what he means. “Yeah, I’ve been working on my British Butler. Ay-wot?” He grins.

“Wot-wot,” Went says, nodding. “You’ll have to show me later. Let’s talk interview prep for now, how about that?” He sits down at the table. “This looks great, Mags.” 

“Yes, absolutely corking, old sport!” Richie says in the British Butler Voice. It’s admittedly not his best, but it makes his dad laugh. 

“Settle down, Richie,” Maggie says, nudging him into his seat as she walks over to her own.

Richie relents, if only because he’s starving from the day of travel and would rather use his mouth for eating. He listens to his dad’s interview advice and hums and nods at all the right times, though he’s not really listening. He’s thinking about other British phrases he can use to improve his Voice. 

After his parents go to sleep, Richie heads up to his room and looks at the cardboard box sitting on his bed. His mother’s handwriting on the taped-on label says _ Richie, 1990. _He sits down on the bed and pulls off the lid, coughing as a cloud of dust puffs up. He peers inside. There’s a whole lot of junk in there — it must’ve been a box he packed when they moved from Maine that he forgot to unpack. He sees some old He-Man action figures, a huge stack of X-Men comics, and a few Star Wars figurines that he vaguely remembers getting for a birthday, or maybe Christmas. He digs around, pushing stuff aside, and then a flash of white catches his eye. Underneath the X-Men comics, he sees what looks like the corner of a polaroid picture, just barely jutting out. It seems to be the only photo in the box. 

Richie grabs the edge of the polaroid and slides it out from underneath the comic books. It’s a picture of a group of kids, all sitting on a porch in someone’s backyard. He recognizes his tween self pretty quickly — stupid hair, enormous glasses that made him look constantly bug-eyed, even more than his current ones. He’s really hamming it up for the camera, grinning with his arm slung around some dark-haired kid with a cast on his arm. He frowns, tapping a finger on the photo, over the boy’s face. He can’t remember who the kid is, who _ any _of these kids are, but the way they’re all huddled together and smiling like they really give a shit about each other… he doesn’t remember ever having friends like this. The tickle in the back of his mind is there again, but it feels less like a tickle and more like an ache. 

“Who the fuck _ are _you,” he whispers at the kids in the picture. He flips it over, and sees his own childish chicken-scratch handwriting on the back. 

_ Bill, Bev, Ben, Eddie, ME!, Stan, & Mike. September 1989! _

As he reads the words, his stomach suddenly twists into a knot, adrenaline flooding his system. He feels like he might puke. What the fuck is going on with him? He drops the picture back into the box, facedown, and stares at the names. Something just outside of his mental grasp is stirring, and it makes him shudder. 

“Oookay, that’s enough strolling down memory lane for tonight,” he mutters to himself. He runs a hand through his hair, feeling shaky and feverish. Maybe he caught some kind of fast-acting horrible disease from all the secret mold festering in this old box. The thought makes him laugh, inexplicably. It sounds like something —

His mind catches before he can finish the thought, and he feels another lurch of his stomach. He scrambles up off the bed and just barely makes it to his trash can in time before he pukes, wincing at the burn of bile in his throat. “Ugh,” he says, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. He stays there for another couple minutes, kneeling on the floor and waiting for the nausea to subside. Once it does, he clambers to his feet and takes his trash can into the bathroom, where he dumps the puke in the toilet and thanks his lucky fucking stars that his parents are both heavy sleepers. 

When he goes back to his room, he puts the lid back on the box and shoves it under his bed without a second glance. Then he turns off the lights, kicks off his jeans, and crawls into bed. Richie tries very determinedly _ not _ to think about the photograph or the names on the back, but one name keeps rolling around in the back of his mind anyway. _ Eddie, Eddie, Eddie. Who are you, man? _

** _ December 2001 _ **

Richie gets the job. Co-hosting a late-night rock music radio broadcast, Mondays through Thursdays, 10 p.m. ’til 3 a.m. He quits his job back in LA, and the look on Al’s face when Richie says he’s got a hosting gig is fucking priceless. He stops by the bar to tell Marco, too, which is a somewhat awkward affair — they haven’t spoken since Richie got shitfaced and punched in the eye. Even so, Marco congratulates him warmly, gives him his phone number and demands an invite to his first show whenever Richie makes it big out in New York. 

He moves back to his parents’ house and starts work by the first week of December. They want him to do his Voices, come up with segments. They want him to _ talk, _ on air, to anyone who’s listening. He brings up the idea of an ’80s nostalgia night once a week, and his co-host, Paul, fucking loves it. Richie’s on cloud nine. Sure, he’s living with his parents again, which isn’t exactly how he pictured himself at 25, but he’s finally _ on the fucking radio, _so he really doesn’t give a shit. Besides, he’s not about to complain about not having to pay rent. 

He tries valiantly not to think about the box under his bed or the photograph for a while. He holds out until the week before Christmas, and then he can’t take it anymore. He wakes up late Friday morning with the name _ Eddie _buzzing in the back of his mind and a churning stomach. He goes downstairs to find his mom cleaning up after breakfast, which he’s apparently slept through.

“Morning, sleepy head,” she says. “There are still some pancakes over there, you can warm them up in the microwave. How was work last night?” 

“Fine,” Richie mumbles, shoving up his glasses so he can rub at his tired eyes. “Hey, mom? You remember any of my friends from when I was a kid?” 

Maggie purses her lips. “Hmm. Oh, I remember that boy you were friends with in high school, Joey? He used to come around the house a lot.”

Richie’s face burns. Joey was a boy he became friends with junior year, and they spent several months hanging out at Richie’s house and playing Nintendo in the living room, and then one day they sat on Richie’s bed and Joey kissed him, and Richie kissed him back, and then they both panicked and never spoke to each other again. “Uh, no, I meant like, back in Maine? Like in middle school.”

“Oh.” She frowns for a second. “Honey, that was so long ago, I don’t really… well, I remember you had a little group of buddies you’d ride bikes with. And that one boy, I can’t remember his name… he had asthma, I think. He used to come over for dinner sometimes.” 

When she says _ asthma, _ Richie jumps slightly. “Eddie?” he says quickly. He didn’t remember until just now, but — _ the frantic shk-shk-shk sound of Eddie shaking his inhaler, the kssh! as he triggered it into his mouth. A shaky voice saying through a wince, “Tastes like battery acid.” _

Maggie, still focused on the dishes, doesn’t notice the way her son looks like he’s just been electric shocked. “Eddie, that sounds right.”

“Do you know his last name?”

She shakes her head. “I’m sorry, Richie, I can’t remember. It’s been over a decade since we moved, you know, I haven’t even heard you mention any of those kids you played with in years.” 

“Right. Yeah, no, sorry,” Richie says. He goes over to the counter and takes the leftover pancakes so he can microwave them, just for something to do, so his mom won’t see the look on his face. When he sits down at the table, his mom ruffles his hair as she walks past him, out of the room. Richie forces the pancakes down despite the lingering nausea. If ignoring these weird almost-memories isn’t going to work, he needs a new plan. 

After choking down his breakfast, Richie goes back upstairs to his room and pulls the box out from under his bed. He dumps the contents on the floor this time, pushing aside comic books and old toys and a broken pair of glasses that he wore circa 1985. He finds the picture again, and sets it aside. Something else catches his eye — a folded piece of lined notebook paper. He picks it up. Written in blocky letters, it says _ DO NOT READ UNTIL YOU GET TO NEW YORK. _ Richie’s brow furrows, and he unfolds the note. The handwriting isn’t his, but it’s familiar, somehow. It’s written in smudgy blue pen. 

_ 9/16/90 _

_ Dear Richie, _

_ I can’t believe you’re moving away when we just started high school. Some fucking friend you are. Who’s going to endure honors biology with me? Big Bill? Fat chance. You’re a traitor and you should’ve just hidden me in one of your suitcases instead. Except, not really, do you know how many diseases there are in a city like New York? Maybe if you tell your parents that then they’ll move you back to Derry! _

_ You haven’t even left yet when I’m writing this and I already miss you. This sucks so bad. You’re still my best friend even if we live in different states now, you know that, right? Don’t be like Beverly and stop writing and calling all of us. I know Ben says it’s probably not her fault that she lost our phone numbers or whatever, but I don’t know. Just don’t do that, okay? _

_ If you ever tell anyone this I’ll skin you alive, but you’re my favorite person and I really would go to New York with you. Even if it means getting exposed to all those diseases and the muggers and shit. So you better write me back, loser. _

_ — Eddie _

_ P.S. I know you said you have it memorized, but just in case, here’s my phone number. DON’T LOSE IT!! _

Richie traces the phone number written at the bottom of the page, his heart in his throat. _ Eddie, _he thinks. He tries desperately to remember more about this kid who was apparently his best friend, who called Richie his “favorite person,” but it’s like there’s a cement wall his mind runs into every time he gets too close. 

Up until about 45 seconds ago, Richie hadn’t thought he’d ever _ been _ anyone’s favorite person. His vision blurs and he realizes he’s crying, like an idiot, which is fucking embarrassing. He blows out a shaky breath and swipes at his eyes under his glasses, and then he gets up, still clutching the letter. He wonders if he ever read it, back then — how could he have forgotten it? He goes out into the hall and grabs the upstairs phone from its cradle. He sets the letter on the end table and dials the number. It’s been more than eleven years since this letter was written, it’s probably a crapshoot to even hope —

“Kaspbrak residence,” a woman’s voice says on the other end of the line. 

Richie has to grab the edge of the table so he doesn’t fall on the fucking floor. The woman’s voice is familiar, and the name, Kaspbrak, has a new flood of memories barreling into Richie so hard they nearly take him out at the knees. _ “You want one from me too, Mrs. K?” _ he hears his thirteen-year-old self saying. He can almost, _ almost _see Eddie’s face, the kid from the photograph, scrunched up in annoyance.

“Hello?” Mrs. Kaspbrak says. Richie can hear the faint sound of a television in the background. “Is this a prank call?”

“No!” Richie says quickly. “No, sorry, I — uh, I dropped the phone. Hi, Mrs. K. This is, um, I don’t know if you’ll remember me, this is Richie Tozier, I was wondering if Eddie —”

She cuts him off almost immediately, and there’s a cold anger in her voice that startles him. “You stay away from my son,” she hisses. “He doesn’t need to be associated with — with dirty, nasty boys like you. After all these years, I will _ not _— you just stay away, do you hear me? Don’t call this number again.” She hangs up.

Richie listens to the dial tone for a few moments, blinking slowly. He pulls the phone away from his ear and blinks some more. “Huh,” he says. He hangs up the phone, sets it back in the cradle. He looks down at the letter. “Kaspbrak,” he says to himself. “Eddie Kaspbrak.” He smiles faintly. “Okay, Eddie Kaspbrak. Guess I’ll try again later.” 

** _ February 2002 _ **

Richie means to call again sooner, but he gets caught up with work and the holidays, and then, frankly, he gets a little scared. He still gets queasy when he thinks too hard about this Eddie Kaspbrak that he can’t quite remember, and every time _ does _ remember something, it makes his head hurt. The whole thing kind of freaks him the hell out. His usual nightmares have gotten weirder, too. He’s still always alone, but now sometimes in addition to the scary monster voice, he hears a kid’s voice screaming in fear — mostly wordless, but occasionally yelling _ “Richie!” _

But it’s been almost two months now, and he hasn’t been able to remember anything new from poring over the letter for the millionth time, or staring at the polaroid until his vision blurs. It’s a brisk Friday morning, and he’s dragged his ass out of bed early despite not getting home from work until almost 4 a.m. He hopes Mrs. K doesn’t have caller ID, or at least doesn’t remember the number he called from last time.

“Hello there!” he says when Mrs. K answers. For some reason, the Voice he goes with is Old-Timey-Radio-Guy. It doesn’t exactly make sense for what he’s trying to do, but at least it’s one of his better Voices. “I’m calling to confirm this is the phone number for Eddie Kaspbrak. I’m from his… alumni association. We want to make sure we have the right contact information on file, ya see.” He winces. Not his best fib — he doesn’t even know where Eddie went to college. There’s no way she’s going to fall for this shit.

“Eddie doesn’t _ live _ here anymore,” Mrs. K says, sounding irritated. “He’s been in New York since he went to your school. Shouldn’t you _ know _that? Do you even work for NYU?” 

“Um, right,” Richie says, feeling his heart speed up. “Of course, ma’am, my mistake. Could you please give me his —”

She hangs up on him. Richie curses under his breath. Alright, so he knows where Eddie is, but New York isn’t exactly _ small. _ Still, the fact that they’ve ended up in the same place, somehow… it feels like a good sign. Richie thinks about Eddie’s letter, how he’d written _ I really would go to New York with you. _

Had Eddie moved to New York for school because Richie lived there? Had he remembered Richie perfectly, all this time, while Richie somehow fucking forgot? It makes him sad, and it makes him feel like an asshole, even if he didn’t intentionally forget his entire childhood. He hopes Eddie will forgive him. If he can ever fucking _ find _him. How the hell is he supposed to find one person in all of New York? 

Then, Richie starts to smile. That’s the nice thing about his job: he’s got one hell of a broad audience. 

The next Monday, at 3 a.m., Richie prepares to sign off. Paul says his usual spiel, and then Richie says, “We’ll be here for all you insomniacs tomorrow night. And, uh, before we go, a quick ‘missed connections’ shoutout from yours truly. If an Eddie Kaspbrak is listening to this, please call the station and ask for me, Richie. Okay, yep, th-th-that’s all, folks! Sweet dreams.” The ON AIR sign clicks off, and Richie takes off his headphones and sets them down on the desk. 

“You know it’s a long shot that he’ll be listening at 3 a.m.,” Paul says, stretching his arms over his head and yawning. “And I’ll bet you ten bucks we get a bunch of weirdos calling into the station now pretending to be him.”

Richie rolls his eyes. “Yeah, maybe, but I don’t know what else I’m supposed to do. Put up fliers around town?”

“Remind me why you want to find this guy again?” Paul says.

“He’s — I had this group of friends back in middle school, and he’s the only one who I have any idea where he ended up.” Richie says cagily. “I think it’d be nice to catch up, see if he’s still in touch with the others, I don’t know.” 

“Mhm,” Paul says. He gets up from his chair and yawns again. “Well, good luck. You can ask at the end of every broadcast if you really want. I think it’s a fuckin’ longshot though, Tozier, I’ll be honest with you.”

“Yeah,” Richie says. He stands up, too, and looks at the station phone. It remains silent. “Yeah, you’re probably right.” 

** _ April 2002 _ **

Richie’s considering giving up. Well, not _ giving up, _ but switching tactics. He’s ended almost every broadcast for the past two months with some variation of “Eddie Kaspbrak, if you’re listening, please call the station and ask for Richie,” and so far, no dice. Paul was right that a few people tried to prank him, but he’s known immediately that they weren’t really Eddie. He doesn’t know _ how _he’s so certain, considering he doesn’t remember nearly anything about his old friend, but he just has a gut feeling that when the real Eddie calls, he’ll know. 

Richie’s just ended his ’80s Night broadcast with Bruce Springsteen’s _ No Surrender, _and Paul’s already given his usual “Keep it real, ladies and germs” sign-off. Richie presses his headphones to his ears with both hands and leans into the mic. 

“Thanks for spending another sleepless night with us, you crazy kids. And as usual, a shoutout to Eddie Kaspbrak, if you’re out there.” Something twinges in the back of his mind, and he finds himself saying, “This is Richie, also known as Trashmouth. Call the station if you’re listening. Sleep tight, don’t let the subway rats bite!” He clicks off his mic and watches the ON AIR sign turn off.

“Trashmouth, huh?” Paul says, taking his headphones off and letting them hang around his neck. “That something new you’re trying out?” 

“I… guess so,” Richie says. “I don’t know why I said that.”

“You’re a weird one, Tozier,” Paul says. He stands up. “Alright, let’s call it a night.”

“Yeah, you go ahead. I’m just gonna wait a couple minutes, see if anyone calls,” Richie says. 

Paul shakes his head. “Suit yourself. See you Monday, Rich.”

Richie waves, and then sets about putting his headphones away and doing whatever he can to drag his feet. Eventually, though, he doesn’t have a good excuse to keep hanging around. He clicks off the light.

The phone rings. Richie nearly shits himself.

He scrambles to flick the light back on, and then lunges for the phone. “Hello?” he says breathlessly.

“Uh, hi. I’m calling for — I’m not on air right now, am I?”

Richie’s heart is pounding wildly in his chest. _ It’s him. It’s really, actually him. _He doesn’t know how he knows, but his palms start to itch. “No, we’re off the air.”

“Okay, good. Is this Richie? Uh, Trashmouth?”

“Yeah,” Richie breathes. “Yeah, who’s this?”

“Eddie Kaspbrak. I — normally I’m not even awake this late, okay, I’ve never heard your fucking radio show in my life, but it sounds like you mention me a lot? In your sign-off? What the hell’s that about?”

“Um.” Richie hesitates. It doesn’t sound like Eddie remembers him either, which is… not what he’s been expecting. “Do you know who I am?” 

“I — I don’t —” Eddie cuts himself off with a sigh that crackles over the line. “No. But when you said — I think maybe I do? Or did? Listen, I’m really fucking tired, why did you want me to call the station, dude?”

“We were friends. Back in Derry. Us and a bunch of other kids,” Richie says slowly. 

Eddie sucks in a breath. “In… Derry…” 

There’s a long pause, filled only by Eddie’s breathing on the other line. It sounds slightly strained. Richie thinks of the inhaler, and then he hears it — _ shk-shk-shk, ksssh! _— just like he’d so recently remembered. 

“Okay,” Eddie says after a moment. “Do you want to meet somewhere? In person? I have… some questions.”

“Yeah,” Richie laughs. “Yeah, I’ll bet. You free tomorrow? I have Fridays off.”

“Um. I can be.” Eddie huffs, and Richie hears him mutter, “This is fucking weird, man, what the fuck.” Then, at a volume more clearly meant for Richie to hear, he says, “Where in the city are you? We can get coffee or something.”

They pick a coffee shop that’s a reasonable middle point between their houses, and agree to meet up around 10 a.m. Richie looks at the clock on the wall; it’s already nearly 4 a.m. 

“Hey, Eddie,” Richie says, before they hang up. “What, uh, what made you tune in tonight?”

Eddie laughs slightly. “I don’t even know. I just couldn’t sleep, and I was scanning through channels and — I heard you saying my name.” He yawns. “Fuck, I need to go to sleep. This has been really fucking bizarre. I’ll, uh, I’ll see you in a few hours, I guess.”

“Roger dodger,” Richie says. “G’night, Eddie.”

“At this point it’s more like good morning.”

“Okay. Good morning, Eddie.”

“Good morning, Richie.” He hangs up.

Richie’s heart continues to hammer in his chest the whole subway ride home, and when he crawls into bed to get a few measly hours of sleep, he finds that he can’t stop grinning. He’s beyond nervous, and the headachey nausea that comes with remembering is pressing in again, but he almost doesn’t care. He knows Eddie’s voice now — it’s new and familiar all at once. He replays Eddie’s quiet laugh in his head until he finally drifts off to sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fic title from "i am easy to find," the song/album by the national. the song lyric at the beginning of this chapter is also off of that album. it's very good. 
> 
> next chapter is going to be QUITE the beast, so i'm not exactly sure when it'll be completed, but hopefully fairly soon! pls leave me a comment if you so desire, i love hearing what parts people like best. :D 
> 
> ok, see y'all next chapter! thanks for reading! byeee
> 
> twitter @hermanngottiieb  
tumblr @joshuawashinton


	2. PART TWO: Eddie

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quick programming note - i originally intended this chapter to span 2002-2016, and, well. OBVIOUSLY that is NOT what happened. so an additional chapter has been added to the plan, and next chapter will span the rest of the time leading up to the events of it chp 2. (featuring much wider time jumps than this chapter, lmao) what can i say, richie and eddie talk a fuckin' lot and i realized this was already getting Very long. 
> 
> content warnings for discussions of sonia kaspbrak's fucked up parenting, and references to period-typical homophobia

_ Don't you know someday somebody will come and find you? _

_ If you don't know who you are anymore, they will remind you _

_ – The National, “So Far So Fast” _

** _April 2002_ **

Richie is going out of his mind with nerves as he walks up to the coffee shop at 10:05 that morning. He spent far more time than he usually ever does getting dressed before he left the house — he even brushed his hair. But then he thought maybe he should be trying to look more like he did when he was thirteen, so he’ll be more recognizable, so he ruffled his hands through it to fuck it up again. Now he thinks he just looks sleep-deprived. 

It doesn’t take him long to spot Eddie, once he’s inside. He’s sitting at a table by the window, holding a cup of coffee and staring into it intensely, like it’ll tell him the future or something. He hasn’t noticed Richie yet, so Richie takes a moment to just look at him. 

Eddie Kaspbrak is scrawny, Richie can tell that even though the guy’s sitting down. He’s got thin arms poking out of his red polo shirt, and a slight furrow to his brow that looks like he’s got Resting Concerned Face. His dark hair is short and looks almost the same as it did in the old polaroid. He looks just as tired and nervous as Richie feels, which is honestly comforting. Looking at him doesn’t quite set off the whole headache-and-queasiness memory thing, but it does stir something in Richie’s chest. Something like, _ oh, it’s you. I know you. _

Richie flinches, suddenly, as a sharp pain twinges in his left palm. He frowns and glances down at his hand. There’s an old scar across the center of his palm, a thin white line. He’s never thought much of it — he was a rowdy kid, he’s got all sorts of weird scars — but it’s never randomly hurt like this before. He purses his lips and closes his hand into a loose fist before letting it drop to his side again. 

He walks up to Eddie’s table and taps his knuckles against it to get his attention. Eddie jumps and looks up from his coffee to stare at Richie with the biggest brown eyes he’s ever seen. “Richie?” Eddie asks.

“The one and only,” Richie says, smiling. He pulls out the chair across from Eddie and sits down. “So, uh, hi.”

“Hi.” Eddie says, and then winces. Richie doesn’t miss the way his left hand flexes momentarily. He narrows his eyes.

“You good?” he asks, gesturing to Eddie’s hand.

Eddie looks uncertain. “Oh. Yeah. I just —” He opens his hand and holds it palm up so Richie can see. There’s a scar there, just like the one Richie has. “It hurt for a second just now, I don’t know why. It’s old.”

“Well, whaddya know,” Richie says. He holds up his own hand to show off his scar, too. Eddie’s eyes widen, and he looks freaked out enough that Richie leans forward to give him a high five, just to break the tension. 

Eddie yelps in surprise, and then frowns. “Um, okay then.” He pulls his hand back, drumming his fingers on the tabletop instead. “So, look, when I heard you on the radio last night — I mean obviously I heard you say my name, and that wigged me out, but that’s not why I called.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. You said… you said ‘Trashmouth,’ and I got like. I don’t know, dude, I got fucking chills all over and I felt really sweaty and scared. And I. I remembered you, kind of. For a second.” He crosses his arms tightly over his chest. “It scared the shit out of me, so don’t make fun of me.”

“I’m not!” Richie says quickly, raising his hands in surrender. “No way, man. That shit’s been happening to me too, that’s why I was looking for you.” He reaches into the pocket of his hoodie and pulls out the polaroid and the letter. “I found these in a box at my parents’ house, that’s what set it off for me.”

Eddie pulls the two items closer. He looks at the picture first, squinting at it for a long time with his mouth pulled down into a frown. He flips it over and reads the names on the back, mouthing them to himself. Richie can see the moment the memory shit hits him, because he gets a little paler and swallows hard, dropping the photo back on the table. He taps the letter and says shakily, “What’s this?”

“Um, it’s a letter. From you.”

“From me?” Eddie repeats. He quickly unfolds it and scans through it. Richie watches his face, watches his eyes widen. His chest is practically jumping from how frantically he’s starting to breathe. “I… what the fuck… I don’t remember writing this.” Eddie shakes his head a few times. He looks up at Richie. “This is my fucking handwriting but I don’t — I don’t remember writing this, I don’t _ know _you —” He fumbles for something Richie can’t see below the table, and a moment later comes up with his inhaler, which he shakes frantically before triggering it into his mouth a few times. 

Richie watches him with concern, leaning across the table. “Hey, it’s okay. I’m right there with you, man, I’ve been going through this shit for months. Just let it pass.”

Eddie nods, pulling the inhaler from his mouth and staring at it for a moment. He shudders. _ “Fuck,” _ he says emphatically.

“Yeah, no shit,” Richie agrees. “Take it easy, Eds.”

“Don’t call me that,” Eddie says automatically, and then his face does a very interesting series of expressions. When he speaks, his nose is scrunched up in an almost familiar irritated scowl, but then his jaw slackens and he stares at Richie like he’s baffled by what just came out of his own mouth. Then, inexplicably, he starts to smile. “I… don’t know why I just said that. Huh.”

“Now you see what I’ve been living with,” Richie says, slapping a hand on the table. “Does this mean you also don’t remember jack shit about your childhood?”

“I… yeah, it’s all kind of a blur. Anything before I left Derry, I guess. You don’t remember either?” Eddie says, frowning again. It seems like that’s a permanent expression for him. “This is so fucked up, dude, why the hell is this happening to us?”

Richie shakes his head. “I don’t have a fucking clue. I mean, I’ve always noticed that my memory of anything before I was fourteen was kinda… fuzzy? But I just thought that’s because it was boring or something.”

“I left Derry when I was eighteen,” Eddie says. “I can’t really remember, like, two thirds of my entire life. My mom thinks I have retrograde amnesia.” 

“What the hell’s retrograde amnesia?”

“It’s a loss of memory of anything prior to an injury or disease,” Eddie recites, like he’s reading from a fucking medical textbook. It makes Richie feel oddly fond. Even so, he raises his eyebrows in disbelief. 

“Okay, what fucking disease-slash-injury happened to you then,” he says flatly.

Eddie fidgets. “I… don’t know. Maybe I forgot that too!” He catches Richie’s incredulous expression and huffs in annoyance. “Look, I don’t fucking know, okay, dude?” He puts his head in his hands, pressing the heels of his palms hard against his forehead. “How’d you even find me? I apparently wrote that letter before I moved and it doesn’t have my last name.”

“I called your mom,” Richie says simply. Eddie lifts his head up at that, eyeing Richie warily. “She’s a real charmer, by the way — hung up on me _ twice, _but not before she called me a ‘dirty, nasty boy.’” Richie does his best imitation of Mrs. Kaspbrak, and from the look on Eddie’s face, Richie thinks maybe he used to do that impression a lot as a kid, too. “What’s up with that? I wasn’t, like, a shithead to you or something, was I?”

“As we’ve established, I literally don’t remember,” Eddie says, rolling his eyes. “But considering I called you my ‘favorite person’... no.” He glances down at the letter again, and Richie wishes he were still making eye contact, so he could decipher his expression. “I don’t think you were a shithead to me, Richie. That’s just… how my mom is. I don’t remember much about my childhood, but I know I moved here to get away from her.”

Richie nods. Somewhere in the recesses of his memories, this feels true. The more he tries to think about it, the less solid his grasp on it is, but he gets a _ bad _feeling when he thinks about Mrs. Kaspbrak all of a sudden. “I’m glad you got outta there, man.”

“Thanks.” Eddie laughs humorlessly. “It’s stupid, though, because I’m literally trying to get her to move out here to live with me now. She’s getting pretty sick, I don’t know, she can’t really take care of herself anymore. She wants me to move back to Derry, but…” He shudders and doesn’t continue.

It’s odd — Richie’s never thought about moving back to his hometown, hasn’t ever had anything that would prompt him to do so, but now that Eddie mentions it, the very idea feels him with an icy cold dread. It’s like he’s just woken up from one of his nightmares, clammy and terrified. Across from him, Eddie is taking a hit from his inhaler again. 

“I think something bad happened to us there,” Eddie whispers. He taps the polaroid. “All of us.”

“Great,” Richie says. He laughs, but it comes out hollow. “Fucking great!”

“Maybe we got brainwashed,” Eddie says. “Like, we were all in a cult or something.”

Richie stares at him. “That,” he says slowly, “is the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard.” 

“Okay, Einstein, what’s your genius fucking theory?” Eddie snaps.

“Man, I dunno. Aliens?”

Eddie throws his hands up. “Are you kidding me?! This isn’t the fucking _ X-Files, _ dipshit, this is real life! You can’t just — why are you _ smiling?” _

Richie is, he can’t help it — he’s beaming like a kid on Christmas. “I don’t know, why are you?” he counters.

Eddie puts his hands on his own cheeks to feel the smile that’s crept, unbidden, across his face. He sags back slightly in his chair. Hands still against his face, he says, “Do you think we did this a lot as kids?”

“What, yelled at each other?” Richie asks, still grinning. “I’m pretty sure we did this all the fucking time, Eddie Spaghetti.” 

The nickname just slips out without him thinking about it, and he sees Eddie shiver a little before pulling a face. “Ugh, I hate that stupid nickname, why’d _ that _have to give me the memory-sweats.” 

Richie snorts. “Memory-sweats?”

Eddie doesn’t reply, just sort of pats his own face idly before letting his hands drop. He looks at Richie curiously, and Richie feels momentarily pinned under Eddie’s gaze. This, too, feels almost familiar — Eddie’s big eyes on him, and Richie helpless to do anything but wait and see if he found what he was looking for. 

“You wanna get something to drink?” Eddie asks finally, gesturing behind Richie to the counter. “And maybe — catch up?” 

Richie’s a little taken aback by the lack of edge to Eddie’s words. He feels the tips of his ears getting warm. “Yeah,” he says, much quieter than he means to. “Yeah, I think that sounds really good.” 

So he does, and they do — Richie learns that Eddie has been working for the past two years as a _ risk analyst, _ and spends several minutes making fun of him for somehow finding the _ most _boring career humanly possible. Eddie’s face scrunches in annoyance and he does this chopping motion with his hand when he really gets going, and it’s all so familiar that it makes Richie’s chest ache with the almost-knowing. Eventually, Eddie admits that he has to go to work; he took the morning off in order to meet up with Richie, but he’s expected in before 1 p.m. Richie is startled to see it’s already after noon. The morning has flown by, and when they get up to leave the coffee shop, Richie very immediately realizes he doesn’t want to say goodbye. 

At least Eddie seems just as reluctant. They stand outside on the sidewalk for a few moments just looking at each other and smiling awkwardly, shuffling their feet. 

“Well,” Eddie says finally, half-raising his arms and then letting them fall to his sides again. “I’m — really glad that you found me, Richie.”

Richie laughs, and his voice catches in his throat, but eventually he’s able to say, “Yeah, I am too.”

Eddie glances around, and then says, “Is it weird if I hug you goodbye? I know we kind of just met, but also I’ve apparently known you forever, and I kinda — I don’t usually do hugs, but I want to hug you for some reason?”

“Oh, for _ some reason,” _Richie repeats. “You sure know how to make a guy feel special, Eds.” 

“Alright, if you’re gonna be a dick about it —”

“That _ is _my name,” Richie says. He grins and opens his arms. “C’mere, you little weirdo.”

Eddie grumbles, but gives Richie a hug, squeezing him tightly. He’s short enough that if Richie lifted his chin a little, Eddie’s head would tuck perfectly beneath it. He thinks maybe this was true at thirteen, too, and it makes him smile. He feels Eddie exhale softly against his shoulder, and then he pulls away. 

“Okay. I’ll be in touch. I got your number.” Eddie pats his pocket, where he stowed the napkin Richie wrote his parents’ phone number on. “We’re gonna figure this shit out, dude. I still think it’s a cult.”

“And I still think that’s dumb,” Richie says, nodding. “I’ll see you soon, Kaspbrak.”

“See you, Trashmouth.” Eddie grins at him, sudden and bright, and Richie’s heart leaps in his chest. _ It’s you, I know you, _he thinks again. Eddie looks so much younger, more like the boy Richie can almost remember, when he smiles. Eddie lifts his hand in a wave, and then he turns and walks away, down the street. Richie watches him go, his own smile fading into something small and thoughtful. He’s not sure where they’ll go from here, but he’s got Eddie back, and that feels like the start of something big. 

** _June 2002_ **

It becomes a regular thing, Richie and Eddie meeting for coffee or lunch or afternoon walks around Central Park, bouncing ideas off each other and trying to see what they can remember. After the first few weeks, they also just start meeting up to talk about other things — about Eddie’s snoozefest of a job and Richie’s far more thrilling late-night DJing. They never go to either of their houses; Eddie has a roommate that he’s not particularly fond of, and Richie just doesn’t want his parents bothering them. 

They’ve come up with a few theories. Eddie’s mother doesn’t seem to have forgotten anything about their childhoods, based on her remembering Richie’s name when he called her. This, Eddie says, is proof that it’s _ leaving _ Derry that makes you forget. They’re not sure if going back would make them remember, because the thought of going back still fills both of them with such a primal, instinctive fear that they know they _ can’t _go back. It’s just not happening. 

Eddie wants to try to find the others in the photo, and Richie does too — they’re blurrier in his mind, but talking to Eddie helps him start to remember how it felt to have friends like that, and he misses them like a phantom limb. But they don’t have anything to go on besides five first names and the sole fact that all of these kids lived in Derry in 1989. It’s certainly not enough to find anyone. 

He’s surprised that it takes him as long as it does to recognize the helium-like feeling in his chest whenever he sees Eddie for what it is — but then, he’s had years of practice in suppressing and ignoring any crushes. He writes it off as just being happy to have his old best friend back, or tells himself the feeling is just what Eddie calls the “memory-sweats.” But one evening in June, he’s just gotten off the phone with Eddie after confirming their plans to get lunch the next day, and he’s replaying the quiet way Eddie had laughed before saying, “Alright, I’ll see you tomorrow, asshole.” It was so fond, affectionate even with the insult thrown in, and Richie can’t stop smiling as he heads to his room and flops down on his bed. He can almost picture Eddie’s expression, the way his mouth twists like he’s annoyed, but it’s really to hide that he’s smiling. It’s so _ cute _—

He sits up again, eyes widening. “Oh, shit,” he mutters. Now that he’s let the thought slip past his conscious defenses, it’s painfully obvious that Richie’s been thinking Eddie is cute this whole goddamn time. His heart starts to pound, and he feels a horrible flood of guilt for even thinking it. _ Stupid doe-eyed little weirdo, _ he thinks to himself, and then, his inner voice reverting to his prepubescent self: _ Cute, cute, cute! _

And just like that, a small tidal wave of memories whacks him upside the head, and the memory-sweats start in earnest. _ He’s thirteen and he and Eddie are wedged together in a hammock, and Eddie’s bare legs are touching Richie’s bare legs and his heart is hammering so hard he thinks it might burst. He’s watching Eddie walk away and his smile fades into nothing because the ache he feels is too big for a kid’s body to contain it. He is looking at Eddie a hundred different times, only to look away the moment Eddie looks back. He is foolish and afraid, and he is desperately in love. _

Richie is expecting the puking this time, he’s grown used to this being his body’s reaction to being bombarded with memories out of nowhere. He even manages to make it to the bathroom in time. When he’s done, he sits on the edge of the tub and tries to breathe. It’s one thing to realize his shameful little crush on Eddie now, but this — this is the big leagues, this is full-blown, love-of-his-life type shit. And now that he remembers it, it feels like it’s always been there, even if he didn’t recognize it for what it was or remember Eddie at all. 

“Ohhh, fuck me,” Richie says, banging his forehead against his open palms a couple times. “Fuck, fuck, _ fuck.” _ How is he supposed to face Eddie at lunch tomorrow, now that he remembers _ this? _

His solution is to steal a bottle of whiskey from his dad’s supply and drink it by himself in his room until he passes out. He sleeps well into the afternoon, and wakes up tangled in his sheets and feeling absolutely fucking disgusting. He frowns blearily at the ceiling, the memory of the night before coming back hazy and then clearer, and he winces hard.

Richie almost jumps out of his skin when he hears a knock on the front door downstairs. He hears his mom walking over to answer it, and he knows, even before he hears the voice, who it will be.

“Um, hi, Mrs. Tozier? You probably don’t remember me, I’m Eddie Kaspbrak. Richie and I were friends back in Maine?”

“Oh! Eddie, of course, you know Richie and I were just talking about you a few weeks back. Come on in. I think Richie’s still sleeping, do you want me to go wake him up?”

Their voices are getting closer as they approach the stairs. Richie, propped up on his elbows, stares at his closed bedroom door with wide-eyed horror. Eddie has never been to his house before. Why is Eddie at his house? 

“No, it’s okay, I’ll just peek in and see if he’s awake,” Eddie says. His voice is right outside Richie’s bedroom now. “Thanks, Mrs. Tozier.” The door starts to open, and Richie flings himself onto his back and pulls his blanket up over his face.

He hears Eddie click his tongue in annoyance, and then the door closes again. Footsteps. Eddie yanks the blanket off Richie’s face, and he’s too startled to remember he’s supposed to be pretending to be asleep. He can’t see very well without his glasses, but Eddie is radiating pure irritation, and Richie doesn’t need to see his features to know that.

“Are you an alcoholic or something?” Eddie demands without preamble, pointing to the mostly empty whiskey bottle on Richie’s nightstand. Richie squints at him before sitting up and fumbling for his glasses.

“No,” he says, trying to sound indignant instead of just embarrassed. “Jesus, can’t a guy have a drink every once in a while?”

“We were supposed to meet up for lunch today and you didn’t show,” Eddie says. He crosses his arms. “I called your house and everything. What the hell, dude?”

Richie looks down at his hands and prays his face doesn’t betray him. “I’m sorry, I overslept.”

Eddie huffs out a very angry sigh, and Richie braces himself for more ranting, but instead Eddie just sits down on the bed next to him and doesn’t say anything. He sighs again, but it sounds more tired than mad this time. “You know, you’re basically like, my only friend,” he says finally. “So it’d be nice if you didn’t do shit like this.”

Richie blinks at him. “I’m your only friend? C’mon, Eds, that can’t be true. You must have other friends.”

Eddie looks at him and smiles thinly. “Not really. People don’t tend to like me.”

“What? Why?”

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed this, Richie, but I’m incredibly fucking annoying,” Eddie says.

Richie barks out a surprised laugh. “What? Are you sure we’re not talking about me here?” 

“Shut up, dick. I’m being serious. I’m fucking — anal retentive to a fault, and I’m well aware of that, okay?” He shakes his head. “I’m not looking for you to pity me, dude, you’re annoying as hell too. I’m just saying.”

“Well, _ I _ like you,” Richie says, too honestly. Eddie stares at him, and Richie feels himself turning red. 

“Richie, you barely know me.”

“I’ve known you since we were children!”

“Yeah, and then you _ forgot _about me for a decade!” Eddie exclaims, gesticulating wildly. “You don’t — it’s been, like, two months, you have no idea.”

“Eds, I mean this honestly and sincerely. I like you, and you’re just gonna have to fucking trust me, alright? I might not remember you all the way, but I _ know _you.” He gives in to impulse and grabs Eddie’s wrist, stopping himself from taking his hand instead, because he thinks that might give away just a bit too much. “And I’m… really sorry I never called, by the way. You know, back then.” He gestures vaguely in the metaphorical direction of 1990.

Eddie glances down at where Richie is holding his wrist, and then back to Richie’s face. He gives a confused little smile, and his eyes are very bright. “Don’t apologize for that, dumbass. You didn’t forget me on purpose. Anyway, I don’t even remember it now, so it’s fine.”

“I know, but. Four whole years of you thinking your best friend turned out to be a complete asshole,” Richie says. “That probably sucked.”

“Yeah, probably,” Eddie relents. He reaches over with his other hand to pat Richie’s, still clutching his wrist. “It’s really fine though. I’m not all broken up about it or anything. But if you could stop being an asshole _ now, _that’d be great.” 

Richie snorts. “Yeah, no promises there,” he says. He lets go of Eddie’s wrist, and Eddie rolls his eyes, and oh _ fuck, _Richie loves him. How did it take him this long to figure that out again? 

He can lock it all away, though, like he did when he was a kid. He’s a pro at that shit. He and Eddie usually tell each other whenever a new memory trickles in, but this one Richie is more than happy to keep to himself. He’s not about to risk compromising things with his best friend — not when he’s only just gotten him back. 

** _August 2002_ **

That day in June knocked down some of their remaining boundaries, and by now Richie is used to Eddie showing up at his house unannounced. His parents are, too, and his mom seems to get a real thrill out of feeding Eddie home-cooked meals. Richie can’t say he blames her — Eddie’s so scrawny, he’s awoken a crazy urge in Richie to like, bake him cookies or something. Like he’s someone’s goddamn grandma. 

All this to say, when Eddie barges into Richie’s room one sweaty Saturday afternoon in August, Richie barely even flinches. He turns around and takes in Eddie’s appearance: he’s wearing a polo shirt tucked into khaki shorts. With a _ belt. _Richie smirks and says, “Nice outfit, Kaspbrak. Going for the dweeb-chic look this summer, I see.” Then he really looks at Eddie’s face, and his grin falters.

Eddie’s staring at the floor, and his whole expression is pinched like he’s holding in some enormous emotional tidal wave, and whatever it is, it doesn’t look good. He’s clutching his inhaler in his fist. He’s trembling, very slightly. 

“Eddie?” Richie says hesitantly. “You okay, man?”

Eddie looks up at him then, and his eyes are very big and rimmed red. “Can I talk to you?” he asks. His voice is quiet, carefully measured. It’s honestly kind of alarming, considering Eddie is usually yelling through half of their conversations. 

“Uh, yeah, of course. Do you wanna sit down?” Richie asks, gesturing to the bed. Eddie nods, and walks over to sit on the edge of the mattress. He looks down at his hands, rolling his inhaler between his palms. Richie, after a moment’s hesitation, sits down next to him. “Eds?” he prompts. 

“I called my mom today,” Eddie says, still in that careful, quiet voice. “I know we said we weren’t going to ask parents about any of this shit until we had more things figured out, but — I don’t know, she’s our only link back to Derry, and I just thought it would be fine. So I asked her, I was like, hey, do you remember what happened during the summer of 1989?” He laughs once, and it’s hollow. “I wasn’t like, accusatory. I was just fucking _ asking, _but she immediately blew up at me. ‘Don’t you do this to me again, Eddie, don’t you dare do this again’.” 

“Do what again?” Richie asks, frowning.

“That’s what I said!” Eddie says, and Richie hates to admit that he’s relieved that Eddie’s yelling now. The forced calm of his voice before was freaking Richie the hell out. “I told her I didn’t know what she was talking about, and she just started saying how that summer made me sick, and I needed to get over my sickness —” He breaks off, and despite the humid quality of the air in Richie’s room, he shivers. “And that’s when I got the _ fucking _memory-sweats, big time. Guess what I remembered?” He holds up his inhaler and wiggles it a little, smiling grimly. “I don’t have asthma.”

Richie stares at him, uncomprehending. “Uh, what?”

“I don’t have asthma. My mom fucking lied to me, and she told me I had to take so many fucking pills — you should _ see _ my medicine cabinet, Rich, there’s like, a dozen little prescription bottles in there, and all of them are _ fucking bullshit.” _ He’s shaking again, fingers clenched tight around the inhaler. “It was worse when I was a kid, I know it was, and now I remember — I _ knew _at one point that it was fake. I figured it out that summer, and I called her out on her bullshit and for a while I didn’t take them anymore, but then I fucking… moved here for school and she had my prescriptions transferred over to a pharmacist here, and I forgot! I forgot that they were fake!” 

“Eddie,” Richie says, putting his hand over Eddie’s, the one gripping the inhaler. “Eds, it’s okay. It’s not your fault.” 

Eddie throws the inhaler across the room, and it smacks into the wall. They both jump at the sound of it clattering to the floor. After a moment, Richie tears his eyes away from it and looks back at Eddie. Eddie is already looking at him. Richie can’t tell what he’s thinking. 

“She just kept fucking _ going _ on the phone today, and I was sitting on my fucking living room floor freaking out, and you wanna know the worst part?” Eddie laughs bitterly again. “The whole time, all I wanted was to use my stupid inhaler. Even after all that remembering.” He sighs. “My whole life she’s been telling me I’m delicate and fragile and treating me like I’m gonna break. My whole life she’s been telling me that I’m _ sick, _ and — and I had a couple years there where I was free of that, where I knew better, but mostly I’ve just. Believed her.” 

“Eddie…” Richie says again. He doesn’t know what he could possibly say to help, but his chest hurts seeing how upset Eddie is. He wants to kick Sonia Kaspbrak’s ass. He remembers faintly, now, feeling the same way in 1989, when Eddie had told him about his medication the first time. 

“But she’s wrong,” Eddie says, speaking over him. His eyes are very bright and intense. “I’m not sick.” 

“That’s right,” Richie says. 

Eddie nods, and his mouth twists, like he’s biting back his words. He looks off to the side for a second and nods again, smaller, more to himself. “I’m _ not _ sick,” he repeats.

“Right,” Richie says again.

And then Eddie leans in close, and Richie’s heart rate immediately goes haywire. Eddie’s hands lift, and before Richie can even process what’s happening, Eddie is removing Richie’s glasses, folding them carefully and then just sort of holding them in one hand. 

Richie’s face goes red, and he’s so flustered he thinks he might actually die. Eddie is so _ close, _Richie is confronted with his dark eyelashes and the faint freckles on his nose and the worn spot on his bottom lip where he’s bitten it too much. Richie forces out a nervous chuckle. “Hey, I need those to see.”

Eddie smiles. His gaze is still very intense, and Richie can’t break eye contact, even as he feels his face getting warmer. “They’ll get in the way,” Eddie says.

“In the way of w—” Richie starts. Eddie presses in and kisses him.

For a moment, Richie’s brain is just static, and he doesn’t move. Then everything kicks back into gear enough that he starts kissing Eddie back. 

He kissed a handful of girls in college, but he’s only ever kissed one other boy. That day when he was sixteen, and Joey had leaned in and kissed him right on this very same bed, in this very same room, Richie had kept his hands clenched into fists in his comforter to stop himself from touching the other boy. Joey hadn’t put his hands on him either, their bodies only touching where their lips met. 

Now, Eddie’s free hand is on Richie’s face, cupping his jaw. His thumb smooths gently across Richie’s cheek. Richie keeps his hands on the bed, flexing against the sheets. His eyes are closed, and he only opens them again when he feels Eddie pull away. He already misses the soft warmth of Eddie’s lips against his. Richie’s heart is pounding. _ This is it, _ he thinks, this is the moment where Eddie will panic and run away just like the only other time Richie slipped up and let a boy kiss him, _ god _he really is sixteen again —

“Richie,” Eddie says quietly. “You can touch me if you want to. It’s okay.” His hand is still on Richie’s cheek. 

“I —” Richie says hoarsely. 

Eddie leans over to drop Richie’s glasses on the nightstand, and then he puts his hand over Richie’s. “It’s okay,” he says again. 

Richie closes his eyes and breathes out slowly through his nose. And then he lets himself believe that Eddie is right. “Okay,” he says, opening his eyes again. Tentatively, he puts his hand on Eddie’s waist. Eddie smiles and starts kissing him again. 

Richie doesn’t exactly have a lot of kissing experience, and it doesn’t seem like Eddie does either, but it doesn’t matter. Everything is gentle and somewhat tentative, and Richie feels like he’s floating outside of his body a little bit, but he’s also never felt more grounded. Like Eddie’s mouth is the only thing keeping him from drifting right out into space. 

“I’ve wanted to do this since I was like, twelve,” Eddie murmurs the next time they break apart for air. 

Richie reels back, staring at Eddie incredulously. “Wait, what? Really? You liked me when we were kids?”

Eddie rolls his eyes. “Yes, dipshit.”

“Don’t _ dipshit _me, how the hell was I supposed to know that?!” Richie exclaims. “I was sitting around pining over you when we could’ve done this the whole time?” 

“Well, probably not,” Eddie says, glancing away. “It was still, you know. The ’80s. And my mom…”

“Right.” Richie blows out a breath, some of his nerves finally starting to dissipate. “Look, speaking of that… my parents. I don’t — I mean, I haven’t ever said anything to them, I don’t know how they’ll —”

“That’s okay,” Eddie says quickly. “We don’t have to tell anyone about this right now.” 

“Alright.” 

“Richie,” Eddie says then, with some urgency. “I — I just feel like I should. Say this. I’m… you get that I’m gay, right?” 

“Yeah, Eds,” Richie says. He smiles nervously. “I mean, me too. Duh.”

“Right.” The corners of Eddie’s mouth twitch, and then he laughs. “Fuck. What a day.”

“Yeah, you’re fucking telling me! Jesus, if I’d known you were gonna charge in here and plant one on me, I’d have cleaned up a little,” Richie says. Eddie laughs again, and Richie does too. Then, sobering slightly, he adds, “I’m sorry about all that shit with your mom. You don’t deserve any of that.” 

“Thanks, Richie.” Eddie leans into him, and Richie’s arms go around him so that Eddie can rest his head against Richie’s chest. They stay like that for a long time.

** _November 2002_ **

The first thing Richie becomes aware of when he starts drifting into consciousness is the sound of drawers opening and closing in quick succession. Then he hears a muffled, “Shit. Fuck!” and more drawer-slamming. He shifts, rolling onto his back and blinking into the semi-darkness of the room. It takes him a minute to process where he is, and then everything comes together in pieces. He’s in Eddie’s bedroom, in Eddie’s apartment. The banging and cursing is Eddie, presumably getting ready for work — in the dark, like an idiot. 

Richie pushes himself up onto his elbows and watches the blurry shape that is Eddie bouncing around on one foot as he tries to yank his pants on. He’s got his shirt on already, unbuttoned and flapping around at his sides. “Eddie,” Richie says groggily, “turn the fuckin’ light on, you weirdo.”

“You were _ sleeping,” _Eddie says. He does up his pants and then walks over to the bed, clicking on the lamp on the bedside table. “I was about to wake you up anyway. You gotta get going, Rich, it’s after seven.”

“Mmm, no,” Richie says. He snakes out an arm to grab Eddie’s wrist and pulls him closer. “Better idea: more sleeping.” 

“Richie, I have to go to work,” Eddie says, but he bends down to kiss Richie anyway. Richie slips his hand into the open front of Eddie’s shirt, sliding his fingers from Eddie’s waist up to his ribs, and Eddie shivers and pulls away with a laugh. _ “No, _stop trying to get me to make out with you. Your breath tastes disgusting.” 

“And yet you kissed me first,” Richie says. He sits up a little more, and Eddie puts one knee on the bed so he can balance himself better as he kisses Richie again, long and lingering. Richie skims his hands up Eddie’s chest, and one of Eddie’s hands threads through Richie’s hair, tugging slightly. Eddie kisses with the same single-minded intensity and focus that he does most things, and it drives Richie wild. 

“You’re fucking insatiable,” Eddie mumbles against his mouth.

“Mhm,” Richie agrees, biting at Eddie’s lower lip.

“Ow, stop,” Eddie says with another laugh. He leans away, trying hopelessly to smooth Richie’s hair back down. “Come on, you gotta leave before my roommate wakes up and sees you here.” 

Richie sighs, flopping down onto his back. “I know,” he says. He looks up at Eddie, who is blurry around the edges since Richie’s not wearing his glasses. Maybe it’s this haziness that makes him blurt out, “We should move in together.” 

Eddie stares at him. He is very, very still. “Richie,” he says slowly. 

“I’m serious!” Richie says, and then he starts talking very fast, his mouth moving quicker than his brain can keep up with. “I’m tired of sneaking around and we spend most days together anyway, and it’s been a while since we’ve been able to figure out anything new about the memory shit, but maybe if we lived together we could — and we could get a one bedroom, think about how much money you’d save on rent!”

Eddie sits down fully on the bed. “Rich,” he says. “If we got a one bedroom… I mean, people would _ know.” _

“We could just say we’re being frugal. People do all sorts of shit to live in New York.”

“Your parents would know,” Eddie says.

Richie hesitates. Then, with more confidence than he actually feels, he says, “Then maybe it’s time they know.” When Eddie doesn’t reply right away, Richie says nervously, “I mean, shit, Eds, if you don’t want to live together, just say so.”

“That’s not what I’m saying,” Eddie says. “I just… I want to make sure you’re serious about this, that you really think about it, and you’re not just saying it because you’re half asleep and want me to stay in bed and make out with you.”

“I do want you to stay in bed and make out with me,” Richie admits. “But it’s not just that. I _ have _ been thinking about this. I know it’s soon, or whatever. But it doesn't feel like I just met you a few months ago, it feels like — you know what it feels like. What is is.”

Eddie shifts closer to him, takes one of Richie’s hands in both of his own and plays with his fingers. “I know.” He squeezes Richie’s hand, and then lets out a breath. “Alright, fine,” he says. “Fuck it, let’s do it.” 

“Really?” Richie sits up again, leaning in close so he can see Eddie’s expression clearly. 

Eddie nods, and then his face breaks into a wide grin. “Really, you fucking lunatic. I can’t believe you pulled this shit when I have to go to work and now I just want to kiss your stupid face off. I hate you.” 

“You love me,” Richie says flippantly.

Eddie’s smile softens, though, and he says quietly, “Yeah.” 

A year ago, Richie was getting punched in the face at a bar in Los Angeles, slouching home feeling miserable and defeated — he hadn’t known then, what was missing from his life. He’s starting to piece it together now, he and Eddie finding fragments in the recesses of their minds and filling in the gaps as they go. Richie wants to find the other kids from his faulty memory, the ones in the polaroid who look happier and braver than Richie can remember feeling in his life. He doesn’t remember them, but he misses them all the same. They’re the biggest missing pieces from his childhood, the gaps he feels like a physical ache. But sometimes, selfishly, he curls his arms around Eddie when they’re falling asleep and thinks, _ If I could only get one of them back, thank god it was you. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> quote at the beginning of the chapter is another the national song from "i am easy to find." 
> 
> next chapter coming at Some Point, i'm going on vacation next week so it probably won't be up as fast as this one ended up being. but hopefully soon! 
> 
> thank u for reading, feel free to share ur thoughts in the comments as always. see y'all later!


	3. PART THREE: Eddie, continued

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> surprise! i managed to finish this chapter faster than i expected, which is SHOCKING considering it's a whopping close to 9000 words. that said, the next one will definitely be a while because i leave for a trip in 2 days. so hopefully this beefy chapter will tide you over! so much happens!! i did my best to make the technology accurate to the year of each scene, but if i got something wrong just kindly ignore it, thank u.
> 
> content warnings for parental deaths, and more mentioning of sonia's horrible parenting. also, richie throws up some more.

_ I remember a kid in the water, I remember a world on fire _

_ I was just coming out of it, it was so hot all summer _

_ – The National, “So Far So Fast” _

** _February 2006_ **

“I’m such a piece of shit.”

“Eddie, c’mon, you’re not. Just sit down.”

Eddie stops pacing, but only for a moment so that he can shoot Richie a wild-eyed, incredulous look. “No, no, I need to — I just need to move right now, I can’t sit down.” He scrubs his hands through his hair, and Richie watches him from the couch. He’s been pacing their living room for ten minutes, ever since he got off the phone with his aunt. 

“If I’d just — I should’ve gone back for the funeral, or I should’ve tried harder to get her to move before, we could’ve just gone to the next town over, I should have —” He stops, sounding short of breath. He presses a hand to his chest. “Fuck. _ Fuck.” _

“Hey, hey.” Richie gets to his feet and hurries over to Eddie’s side. He puts his hand against Eddie’s chest and gently places Eddie’s hand on his chest, breathing slow and even. “Deep breaths with me, man. C’mon, you’re okay.” 

Eddie sucks in a breath and lets it out in a gusty exhale. “She stopped answering my calls months ago. I don’t even remember the last time I talked to her, what I said.” 

“That was her choice,” Richie says. “That’s not on you.”

“I just feel like,” Eddie pauses, takes another deep breath, “like I should have taken care of her. Isn’t that what I’m supposed to do? I’m her son. She took care of me, right? Like, in her own fucked up way.”

Richie frowns. “Eddie, she was abusive.” 

“She didn’t, like, hurt me. She never hit me or anything,” Eddie mumbles. 

“Eds, come on. Listen to what you’re saying. If it was me, would you —”

“But it’s _ not _ you,” Eddie says sharply, and Richie is startled into silence. “You don’t get it, your parents are perfectly fucking pleasant people, and they’re both _ alive.” _

Richie chews on the inside of his cheek, unsure of what to say. Eddie’s not wrong — Richie _ doesn’t _know what it’s like, to grieve for a parent like Sonia Kaspbrak. He keeps his hand against Eddie’s sternum, feeling the steadying rise and fall, the filling and emptying of his lungs. After a moment, Eddie’s hand against Richie’s chest curls slightly. He takes a fold of Richie’s t-shirt between his forefinger and thumb and rubs it idly between them. 

“I know you’re right,” Eddie says, quietly. “She wasn’t… a good person. She treated me like shit, and she was miserable to everyone else, and the only relationship she wanted was for me to go right back to being under her thumb. I guess I just wanted things to be different, at the end. For her to be different.” 

“I get that,” Richie says. He puts his arms around Eddie and hugs him close, trapping Eddie’s arm between their chests in the process. “Like, she was awful but she was still your mom. Shit’s complicated.”

“Yeah,” Eddie says hoarsely. He sniffles. “Okay, fuck, we can’t talk about this anymore or I’m gonna start crying, and I don’t want to cry at ten in the fucking morning.” He pulls back and pinches the bridge of his nose for a moment before exhaling hard. “Okay. Okay. I’m okay.”

Richie eyes him doubtfully. “Are you?”

“Fucking _ no, _Rich, but just go along with my bullshit,” Eddie says. He huffs, and Richie can’t help but smile slightly. He leans down to kiss Eddie’s hair. Eddie relents, his shoulders relaxing. Then he says, “My aunt said she’s shipping me some stuff from my mom’s house. Like, things from my old bedroom. Maybe we’ll finally get to add something to the board.”

“God, it’s been like two years,” Richie says. “We haven’t even looked at it since, what, December?” 

“Must be,” Eddie nods. He disentangles from Richie’s embrace and walks over to the couch, getting up on his knees to reach behind it and pull out the corkboard they keep hidden there. 

The board has every piece of evidence they’ve collectively pieced together about their childhood. The top of the board says _ DERRY, MAINE _in Eddie’s precise handwriting. Eddie’s letter and the polaroid are pinned there, along with a list of their names and their five friends, with the information they know about them written beside each name. Only Eddie and Richie’s names have anything significant written beside them — Beside “Bev” Richie has written “moved away after Sept. 1989 but before Sept. 1990?” There are sticky notes with fragments of dreams and memories scrawled across them, and a piece of paper that says “CULT” on one side and “ALIENS” on the other.

Beneath “CULT,” Eddie has written:

  * brainwashed?
  * same scar on hands (part of cult ritual?) 

And beneath “ALIENS,” Richie has written:

  * yellow eyes in dreams
  * memory wipe = alien technology!
  * same scar on hands (from alien probing??) 

Beside the last note on Richie’s side of the page, Eddie has drawn a frowny face. 

“Christ,” Richie says, when Eddie’s propped the board up against the couch and stepped back so the two of them can look at it. “I forgot how insane this looks. I really look forward to the day we forget to hide this before my parents come over. They’re gonna think we’re serial killers or something.”

“Maybe they’ll think _ you _ are,” Eddie says. “Your parents love _ me.” _

“They do,” Richie agrees. “They think you’re a good influence. My mom said you’re the only reason I eat vegetables.” 

“Well that’s just true,” Eddie says. “I swear, it’s like you _want _to get scurvy.”

“Arr,” Richie says in a Pirate Voice. Eddie elbows him in the ribs. 

It takes a couple weeks for the boxes from Eddie’s aunt to arrive at their apartment. Richie staggers out of the bedroom late one Saturday morning — he’s gotten more hours to DJ at the station over the past couple years, which is great, but it also means he doesn’t get Fridays off anymore and he’s fucking _ wiped _when he gets home at 4 a.m. — to find Eddie sitting in their living room with two large cardboard boxes on the coffee table. Eddie is eyeing them like he expects them to explode. The boxcutter sits untouched on the table next to the packages.

“Morning,” Richie mumbles, dropping onto the couch next to Eddie and leaning heavily against him. 

“It’s almost noon,” Eddie tells him, not looking away from the boxes. “My stuff came.”

“I can see that,” Richie says. Groaning, he sits up straight again and reaches for the boxcutter. Eddie swats his hand away. “Christ, Eds, we gotta open them eventually. What are you expecting is gonna be in there, live snakes?”

“Why would you _ say _that,” Eddie whines. “No, asshole, I just — want to do it myself.” He grabs the boxcutter and lets out a breath. Then he slices open the top of the first box and pulls the flaps open, peering inside. He inhales and then squeezes his eyes shut. 

“Eddie?” Richie touches the small of his back.

“It’s fine, it just. Smells like my old house.” Eddie shakes his head. “Whew. Okay. Here we go. Time for the memory-sweats.” 

The first box doesn’t trigger anything particularly important, memory-wise, at first — Eddie smiles slightly at old toys, comic books, some clothes. At one point Richie pulls out a pair of tiny red shorts and cackles with absolute delight.

“Eds,” he says, holding up the shorts, “do you think you’d still fit in these?”

“No, asshole, because those were made for a child and I’m almost thirty years old. You lunatic.” He snatches the shorts from Richie’s hands, frowning. “Hmm. Do you — did we get in a rock fight?” 

Richie startles, sitting up a little straighter. A sudden sharp, phantom pain blossoms above his eyebrow, and he rubs at it. “Yeah. I think so. I don’t remember why, but it was intense. I feel like someone almost died.”

“Yeah. Shit.” Eddie shudders. “I can’t believe I got away with doing shit like that back then. My mom would’ve had an aneurysm if she knew what we got up to.”

“Like playing in the sewers,” Richie hears himself say. Eddie stares at him. Richie stares back. There’s that awful swooping sensation in his stomach, and his hands feel cold and clammy.

“Are you going to throw up?” Eddie asks, eyes still wide with alarm. He’s gone very pale. 

“Yup,” Richie says, and heaves himself off the couch to go puke in the kitchen sink. Eddie lets out a quiet noise of dismay, but there was no way Richie was going to make it to the bathroom, and Eddie would pitch a fit if Richie hurled on the floor halfway there instead. 

Richie stays hunched over the sink even after the nausea passes, feeling the sweat on his forehead and the rapid pounding of his heart. It’s been a while since a memory made him _ scared _like this. Like one of his nightmares. He turns on the sink to rinse everything down the drain.

He hears Eddie coming up behind him, and feels a cool hand pressing against the back of his neck, pushing his sweaty hair aside at the nape. “You good?”

“Mmmyep,” Richie says. He clears his throat. “Yowza. That was a fuckin’ _ doozy.” _

Eddie combs his fingers through Richie’s hair, and Richie closes his eyes and lets the sensation calm the leftover jitters in his system. “Your hair’s getting long,” Eddie comments after a few seconds of quiet.

“Yeah. My mom keeps saying I should cut it.”

“Don’t,” Eddie says, tugging on it gently. “I like it like this.”

Richie lifts his head and looks at Eddie with a smirk. “Oh, _ do _ you?” His glasses have slipped down the bridge of his nose, and he shoves them up with his thumb. “I had no idea.” Eddie, it turns out, is _ very _into pulling Richie’s hair. Which is just fine by Richie. 

“Don’t even start, we still have another box to go through,” Eddie says, his eyebrows pinching together in annoyance. He turns away and walks back to the living room, and Richie follows him with a lingering smile on his face, momentarily distracted from the soul-clenching fear that _ the sewers _had brought to mind. He doesn’t understand it, not really, but he knows that it’s capital-B Bad, in the same way that he knows Derry is Bad. It feels like a fundamental truth, like instinct, like it’s carved into his bones. 

At the top of the second box, there’s a paperback book with a glossy cover featuring a woodpecker. _ Bird Species of the Northeast, _the title says. Eddie picks it up, hefting it in his hands. “This can’t be mine,” he says, frowning slightly. “I don’t like birds.”

“Maybe it was your mom’s?” Richie offers. “Your aunt could’ve packed it by mistake.” 

“Maybe…” Eddie says. He flips open the front cover. Richie leans in to look with him. Written there, across the top right corner of the first page, it says _ Property of Stanley Uris. _

“Stan,” Richie breathes. His left palm twinges. “Oh _ shit, _it’s Stan! Stan fuckin’ Uris!” He knows he’s grinning like a maniac, but he can’t help it. “Eds, we have another last name! We can fucking find him!” 

“Holy shit,” Eddie says. “Holy shit! Why do I even have this!”

“Maybe he let you borrow it, or he left it in your room or something,” Richie says. He shakes his head. “Whatever, who cares, how do we find him.”

Eddie drums his fingers on the book. “We could see if he’s on LinkedIn.” 

Richie doesn’t have a LinkedIn account, but Eddie does, so they boot up their computer, pull up Eddie’s account, and Richie types “Stanley Uris” into the search bar. A few people pop up in the results, and Richie scrolls through them slowly. He knows what Stan looked like as a kid, roughly — he has the polaroid to go off of, where Stan has bandages wrapped around his head for some reason, and now that memories are starting to trickle back in, he thinks he can sort of picture him: perfectly pressed clothes, shirt tucked in, fastidious and precise, always pausing the put up the kickstand of his bike while the rest of them let their bikes clatter to the asphalt. 

“Stop,” Eddie says, clutching Richie’s arm. He points to the screen at a _ Stanley Uris, accountant _from Atlanta. Richie looks at the eyes of the man in the photo and, though he’s now seventeen years older, they’re the same as they’d been at thirteen. Eddie starts smacking Richie’s arm. “That’s him! That’s him!” he yells in Richie’s ear.

“I know! I know!” Richie yells back. He clicks on Stan’s profile and skims through it. “Oh shit, there’s his email address. Okay. We should email him, right?”

“You do it,” Eddie says, still digging his fingers into Richie’s arm. 

Richie turns to look at him. “Why me?” 

“He was your best friend,” Eddie says, like it’s obvious.

“I thought you were my best friend.”

Eddie rolls his eyes. “I mean, yeah. We were all each other’s best friends. But you and Stan knew each other forever, way before I knew you or any of the others. You don’t remember?” 

Richie does, now that Eddie’s said it. He remembers being as young as five and sitting with Stan in the field during recess, methodically pulling up blades of grass and piling them on Stan’s legs while Stan just as methodically brushed them away. He smiles, momentarily unable to speak past the lump in his throat. “Stan the Man,” he says after a moment. “Goddamn.” 

_ To: stanleyuris@aol.com _

_ From: richrecordstozier@hotmail.com _

_ Subject: Derry (pls open) _

_ Hey Stan. _

_ You probably don’t remember me, which I don’t take personally, even though I like to think I’m pretty unforgettable. It’s Richie Tozier. Maybe you’ll remember “Trashmouth,” that seems to have an effect on people. We grew up together in Derry, Maine, and something fucked up happened to us and our friends in 1989. You remember Eddie Kaspbrak? (Probably not. He’s also very memorable, though. Think tiny and full of rage.) We’d both really like to talk to you about all this shit. If you’re feeling a weird panic and start sweating or puking while reading this, that’s normal. Give us a call when you get this, ok Stan the Man? Here’s our home phone number: (917) 555-1765. _

_ Hope to hear from u soon, _

_ Richie _

_ P.S. I can’t believe you became a fucking ACCOUNTANT, dude. Lame. Typical Stan, but lame. _

** _March 2006_ **

Richie watches from the passenger seat as the suburbs of Atlanta pass by the window. Eddie, in the driver’s seat, is ranting steadily about every other driver’s incompetency. Richie had left Eddie in charge of selecting their rental car, which meant that he picked a fucking Escalade. When they left the airport and picked up the car, Richie had turned to Eddie with a smirk.

“Compensating for something, shortstack?”

Eddie had dropped his suitcase deliberately on Richie’s foot. 

Now, they’re driving toward Stanley’s house, his address plugged into the GPS on the dash. Richie feels stretched like a rubber band, ready to snap apart from nerves. When he and Eddie found each other almost four years ago, neither of them knew what was happening to them. Richie didn’t even have a wild guess. But now, they’ve both entrenched themselves so deeply in their theorizing and remembering — what if Stan doesn’t believe them? What if he throws them out? What if, after all this and flying to fucking _ Georgia, _they’re forced to walk away from one of their best friends a second time? 

Stan had called them a day after Richie sent the email. He sounded shaken, and he had a lot of questions. Mostly, _ why can’t I remember you, why _ do _ I remember you a little, what do you mean something fucked up happened to us, why do I feel sick, _all to be expected. Richie and Eddie did their best to explain, but they both knew that tangible objects worked better than words for triggering the memories — the bird book, the photograph. 

“We could come down to visit,” Richie had said. “We’ll bring the stuff we’re talking about, it’ll make more sense if you see it.”

“I…” Stan hesitated. Richie could practically hear his mind whirring, sorting through to the most logical solution. God, he’d missed Stan. “I think you should do that,” Stan said finally. “It feels crazy to say this, because I don’t really remember you at all, but I really want to see you guys.”

“Believe me, it doesn’t sound that crazy,” Eddie said.

The SUV rounds the corner of a neighborhood street, lined with big, nice-looking houses with front lawns and picket fences and everything. Richie presses his face against the window and drums his fingers on the glass. 

_ “Your destination is on the left,” _the robotic voice of the GPS says. Eddie parks the car alongside the curb of one of the picturesque houses. 

“Are you nervous?” Richie asks, peeling himself away from the window and looking at Eddie. 

Eddie’s hands clench around the steering wheel. He nods. “A little, yeah. I’m excited, though. It’s been a really long time with just the two of us. I… I miss everyone all the time, you know?”

“Me too.” Richie reaches over to squeeze Eddie’s shoulder, and Eddie smiles faintly at him before he lets go of the wheel. They clamber out of the car and grab their bags from the backseat, and then they walk up the stone path to Stan’s front door. He has a nice porch, with a porch swing and a little table with a few unlit citronella candles on it. 

Richie knocks on the door. Eddie has both hands clutched in a death grip around the handle of his rolling suitcase. 

The door swings open, and then Stanley Uris is standing in front of them. He’s wearing an argyle sweater and reading glasses. He takes the glasses off, sticking them in the collar of his sweater as he stares at Richie and Eddie for a long moment, mouth slightly agape. Richie sees Stan’s left hand clench at the same time he feels his own scar throb with a brief, sharp pain, like glass cutting through it. 

“Well holy shit,” Stan says finally. “It’s really you.”

“Hey, Stan,” Eddie says. His voice sounds slightly wobbly. Richie can’t even speak for a moment, just stares at Stan with a big, stupid smile creeping across his face. 

“Hi.” Stan seems to shake himself out of his daze and then he’s grinning at them, pulling them into a hug. Richie presses his face into the material of Stan’s sweater and lets himself feel it, the waves of _ I know you, I missed you _that he hasn’t felt since he saw Eddie in the coffee shop four years ago. “Shit, it’s good to see you,” Stan says, pulling back. “Here, come in, come in.”

Eddie and Richie step over the threshold into Stan’s very nice home, and a very pretty woman with a kind smile comes around the corner and waves at them both. “Hi, you must be Richie and Eddie.”

“This is my wife, Patricia,” Stan says, putting an arm around her. 

“Stan the Man got _ hitched?” _Richie exclaims. “Goddamn, I should be calling you Stanley the Manly now, how’d you rope this fine lady into —”

“Beep beep, Richie,” Stan says, deadpan, cutting him off. Richie blinks at him, and Stan blinks right back, both of them looking at each other in mutual befuddlement before Richie starts laughing. 

“Oh _ man, _I haven’t heard that one in a while. I missed you, man.”

“Yeah,” Stan says, his mouth twitching in a smile. “Here, you guys want to sit down? Oh, and we can take your things to the spare room. There’s only one bed, I didn’t know if one of you wanted to crash on the couch, or…” He trails off, giving them a discerning look.

Richie swallows. He glances at Eddie, who raises an eyebrow and shrugs slightly. It’s not that Richie thinks Stan is a bad person — it’s just that he doesn’t _ know _ how he’ll react, he doesn’t think he ever told anyone when they were kids and if Stan can’t accept him, can’t accept _ Eddie and him together, _Richie isn’t sure what he’ll do. “Uh, no, one bed will be fine,” he manages. He grabs Eddie’s hand and squeezes. “We’re sort of — you know. Together.”

The brief second of processing time nearly sends Richie into cardiac arrest, but Stan just smiles. “Good for you guys. And good for your backs, too — that couch is _ not _comfortable.” 

They end up sitting in Stan’s living room, and after making some small talk between the four of them, Patricia kisses Stan’s cheek and says she’s got to tend to the chickens — because Stan has _ chickens, _ and a _ garden, _that’s the kind of life he’s living — and pointedly leaves them to talk in private. 

“So,” Stanley says, after watching his wife leave the room. “You two want to start explaining what the hell is going on?”

Eddie sets the bird book on the coffee table between them, and Richie places the polaroid next to it. Stan picks up the book, frowning slightly, and smooths his fingers over the cover.

“I left this at your house,” he says slowly, to Eddie. “Before I moved. You were sad that I was leaving and I think… I think we’d just found out Richie was moving soon too, so I left this for you.” He winces and puts the book back on the table, pressing his thumbs to the corners of his eyes for a second. “I didn’t remember that until just now. Shit, I don’t feel so great.” 

“It happens,” Eddie says. “Honestly, that was really impressive. I don’t think either of us got back any memories that clearly until like, years into this shit.”

“I have these dreams,” Stan says. “I’ve had them forever. They’re just… lights. Three big, bright lights, spinning. And I wake up and I feel…” He shakes his head and shivers, and then runs a hand along his jaw. Richie can see, now, a faint ring of scars along his face. He thinks of the bandage around Stan’s head in the polaroid, and he can almost remember where the injuries came from, but his mind jerks away from it like a hand on a hot stove.

“Welcome to the nightmare club,” Richie says with a wry smile.

“So you two have been dealing with this for years?” Stan asks. “And you still haven’t figured out what it is?”

“Well it’s not like we have a whole lot to go on, _ Stanley,” _Richie retorts. “What you see before you is about fifty percent of our conspiracy corkboard back home.” 

“Conspiracy corkboard,” Stan repeats.

“It’s where we’re collecting clues,” Eddie says, like they’re detectives or something. It had been Eddie’s idea, the board, and Richie thinks he’s just excited to finally get to tell someone else about it. “We’ve got lists of what we remember and evidence to back up our theories —”

“My money’s on aliens, by the way,” Richie interjects. “And if you’re a smart man, Uris, and I know you are, you’ll agree with me.”

“Shut the fuck up, Richie,” Eddie snaps. “It’s so _ obvious _that it’s a cult thing, I don’t know why you’re still —”

“I’m sorry, last I checked cults can’t do full-blown memory wipes or make scars start tingling like fucking homing devices —”

“I swear to god it’s like you didn’t read any of the books I gave you about hypnosis and brainwashing, it’s real fucking science —”

“Hypnosis is not _ science, _ Eds, my _ god _—”

“Were all of our friends this irritating?” Stan interrupts, and Richie and Eddie both turn to look at him. “Or is it just you two?” 

“How rude,” Richie sniffs. “And after everything I put into this friendship, Stanley, I —” he snaps his fingers, a memory slotting into place — “I went to your fuckin’ bar mitzvah, man!”

Stan brightens as the memory hits him, too. “That’s right! I think we were all fighting then, but I don’t remember why. You were the only one who showed up.” 

“You swore in a synagogue,” Richie says, smiling wistfully. “It was the coolest you’d ever been or ever will be.” 

Stan laughs. “Hey, screw you, Tozier.” 

“Screw me yourself,” Richie leers.

Eddie whacks him on the arm. “Beep beep, Richie. Stop flirting with Stan.” To Stan, he adds, “Thanks for reminding us of that one, by the way. I really could’ve used that phrase over the past few years.” 

“How long have you two been…” Stan gestures between them. Richie’s face flushes.

Luckily, Eddie takes it in stride. “Rich was able to track me down in, what, April of 2002? We didn’t get together until the end of the summer, though. Had to sort through some repressed memory bullshit first.” 

“You two used to flirt all the time when we were kids,” Stan says. “It used to drive me _ crazy, _you were always climbing all over each other and yelling all the time. I think I talked about it once to Bev —” He stops, smile fixed in place, eyes distant. He clenches his hands around his knees. “I talked to Bev about a lot of things, at the end of the summer.”

“You good, man?” Richie asks, leaning forward. Tentatively, he touches Stan on the arm, and Stan seems to come back from whatever memory he’d lost himself in. 

“Sorry. It’s hard to remember things. Like the more I try to focus on them, the hazier they get.” Stan sighs. “I think you’re right though. Something fucked up happened to us that summer. I just don’t know what it was.” He glances over to the glass-paned doors leading out into the backyard. Patricia is visible through them, kneeling in front of their garden boxes. “I’d like to tell Patty about all of this, if it’s okay with you two. I’ve been telling her about my dreams for years, and I — I don’t know if she’ll _ understand, _but maybe it’ll help to have an outside perspective.”

“As long as she’s not gonna think we’re all head cases,” Richie says. 

“Well, she might think _ you _are, Trashmouth, but that’s just because of your sparkling personality,” Stan says. Eddie cracks up, and Richie throws up his hands in exaggerated offense.

They spend some time learning about Stan’s life — looking at the photo album from his and Patty’s wedding, a couple old pictures from Stan’s bar mitzvah that he gives to Eddie to include on the corkboard back home — and then, after dinner, Stan sits down with Patty and the three of them explain the whole situation to her, as best they can. 

She takes it remarkably well, nodding and listening with an intent look on her face. When they’ve finished filling her in, she’s quiet, thoughtful. Stan is holding her hand and squeezing it, looking nervous. Finally, Richie says, “So… thoughts?”

Patty says, “Sounds like alien abduction, if you ask me.”

Richie punches the air and lets out a whoop of triumph, while Eddie puts his head in his hands. _ “Fuck _yes! Patty Uris, you are my new best friend. Stan really knows how to pick ’em.” 

Patty laughs, a little bemused, and Stan reaches over to sympathetically pat Eddie’s arm. Richie flings an arm around Eddie’s shoulders, and Eddie lifts his head up to squint at Richie and hiss, “I hate your guts.”

“Aw, Eddie baby, don’t be like that.” Richie kisses him on the cheek. He doesn’t even feel the flinch of panic at doing it in front of Stan and Patty, which he thinks is frankly applause-worthy character growth. Maybe Eddie thinks so too, because he just grumbles under his breath instead of biting Richie’s head off. 

They head to bed in Stan and Patty’s guest room around midnight, and after changing into their pajamas and kissing for a little bit (nothing too frisky, because Eddie says it’d be rude to hook up in Stan’s spare bed on their first night here), they crawl under the covers and click off the bedside light. Eddie nudges at Richie’s shoulder until he rolls over, and then Eddie comes up to spoon him from behind. They alternate who gets to be big spoon pretty often, but Richie’s noticed over the years that Eddie usually wants to be the big spoon when he’s worried about something. 

Hoping to ease some of the tension he can feel in Eddie’s body against his back, Richie says, “Aw, my little jet pack.”

“Shut the hell up,” Eddie mumbles into Richie’s shoulder.

Richie covers Eddie’s arms with his own. “What’s on your mind, spaghetti-head?” 

“Ugh,” Eddie says. He bumps his nose into a notch of Richie’s spine. “Did you notice… when we were telling Patty about everything, it seemed like Stan had some pretty vivid memories. Like, he mentioned details I don’t even remember telling him.” 

Richie frowns, tracing his fingertips along the back of Eddie’s hand. “I mean, maybe talking about it was bringing up more memories for him. That’s happened to us too.”

“Yeah…” Eddie says, but his voice is doubtful. “Seemed like he was remembering a lot more than we did from the beginning, though. I don’t know, it’s just weird.”

“Everyone reacts to this shit differently,” Richie says. “I mean, look at us — you get panic attacks and I yartz my guts out.”

_ “Ugh,” _Eddie says again, emphatically. 

Richie grins. “You worry too much,” he says. Then, hesitating a moment, he adds, “That shit he said about his dreams really spooked me, though. I don’t know why, I have fucked up dreams too, but… you know?”

“Yeah.” Eddie’s voice is very quiet. “Sometimes even though I want to figure all of this out… sometimes I really wish we could just drop it and stop trying to remember. It scares the shit out of me.”

“I know.” Richie lifts Eddie’s hand to his mouth and kisses his palm. “Once we know everything, it won’t be so scary.” He’s lying out of his ass, and they both know it — the only thing Richie is certain about all of this is that it scares him all the way down to his marrow, a fear he has no face or name for. 

Eddie’s hand creeps up under Richie’s shirt then, smoothing over his soft stomach and trailing up to his sternum before sliding back down. Eddie’s hand is cold, because he has terrible circulation, but Richie’s skin still flushes hot where Eddie’s fingers brush. 

“Hey, you said no fooling around in Stan’s bed,” Richie says.

“I’m not trying to fool around, dick,” Eddie retorts. “I’m just — reminding myself.”

Richie’s brow furrows. “Of what? My early onset beer gut?”

_ “No.” _Then Eddie’s voice goes small and sheepish. “That you’re here.”

“Oh.” Richie closes his eyes against the sudden rush of emotion. He puts his hand over Eddie’s through his shirt. “I’m not going anywhere, Eds.” 

“Good.” Eddie kisses the nape of Richie’s neck, and then snuggles in a little closer. “Okay, let’s go to bed, I’m fucking tired.”

Richie laughs. “Sure thing. Take us to dreamland, Rocketman.” 

Eddie pinches Richie’s side, making him yelp, and then they settle into sleep. 

** _July 2007_ **

Richie is wandering a bookstore, searching for a suitably boring birthday gift for Stan, when he sees a display and something stops him in his tracks. 

**From the best-selling author of ** ** _The Black Rapids_ **

**William Denbrough’s **

** _The Glowing_ **

The book’s cover features three orbs of light shining out from the black of the background. The title and author’s name are in bold, red font. Richie picks up the book, frowning. He’s never been a big horror novel reader — never really been a novel reader in general, if he’s being honest — but something oddly draws him to this one. He flips it over to read the back, and sees a picture of the author, a serious-looking man about Richie’s age with glasses perched on the edge of his nose. The start of his author bio reads _ William “Bill” Denbrough _and Richie doesn’t read another word because his stomach lurches and his knees buckle and he almost collapses into the book display. As it is, he clutches wildly for the table with one hand, still gripping the book in the other. He’s suddenly incredibly sweaty. An older woman walking past shoots him a mistrustful look, and Richie smiles unconvincingly at her. 

“Bill,” Richie mutters to himself. The memories hit him in vague waves, as they tend to do — a big silver bike; Bill yelling Richie’s name in distress, and then in anger; Bill’s hand holding a broken bottle shard to Richie’s palm. Richie’s own voice, angry and shaky and scared, saying, _ “I told you, Bill. I fucking told you.” _But whatever he told Bill, Richie’s mind skitters away from that. 

He pulls his cell phone from his pocket and flips it open, shooting a brief text to Eddie. 

> **RT: **DENBROUGH 

He doesn’t give any more context — he’s testing something. Less than a minute later, he gets two texts from Eddie in quick succession.

> **EK: **Bill??
> 
> **EK: **Oh shit

That’s all the confirmation Richie needs, if his roiling stomach and sweaty palms weren’t enough. He buys the book, along with Bill’s first book, and when he gets home he and Eddie call Stan. 

“Big Bill,” Stan says wonderingly, when Richie’s read aloud the author bio off the back of Bill’s newest book.

Richie wheezes. “I’m sorry, _ what _did you just say?”

“That’s what we all called him!” Stan protests. _ “You _called him that more than any of us!”

“Whatever you say, Stanny boy.” Richie grins. He looks down at the photo on the book jacket again, and his smile turns genuine and fond. “Kinda cool that he’s a _ best-selling author _now. Good for you, Bill.” 

“He used to tell crazy good stories when we were kids,” Stan says. “Do you guys,” he breaks off and laughs before continuing, “do you guys remember the story he told at Eddie’s twelfth birthday party? We were sleeping over at Bill’s house, and Eddie almost pissed his sleeping bag, he got so scared.”

Eddie scowls. _ “I _don’t remember that,” he grumbles. 

Richie smirks at him, but says, “I don’t really remember either.”

“Yeah, he told this story about… about a hand that came up out of the sink drain,” Stan says. “And it had long fingers with all these extra knuckles, and — I’m ruining it, it was scarier back then, how he told it.”

Richie and Eddie exchange glances. They’ve just had to accept that for whatever reason, Stan’s memories come back to him clearer and fuller than theirs do. Richie flips the book back over and looks at the glowing orbs on the cover. He thinks about Stan’s nightmares, and — well. He wonders. 

As usual, his mind won’t let him go much further than that. 

There’s no way to contact Bill directly, but the inside jacket of Bill’s first book lists his literary agent’s email address for inquiries. Richie composes an email from himself, Eddie, and Stan, where he vaguely mentions Derry and suppressed memories and Something Important and Bad. They wait for months, but no one ever emails him back. 

** _October 2010_ **

It’s Halloween night, and Stan and Patty have flown up to New York for the weekend. Richie and Eddie’s apartment complex doesn’t tend to get a lot of trick-or-treaters, so the bowl of candy sitting on their coffee table has been slowly depleted by four adults in their thirties instead. Currently, Richie is reading aloud to everyone from Bill’s latest book, _ The Dark. _

Stan is sitting on the couch, Patty laying down with her head in his lap. Stan is wearing a black t-shirt that says “This Is My Halloween Costume” underneath his cardigan, because he’s a killjoy like that. Patty isn’t wearing a costume, either, but at least her jack-o-lantern shirt has _ glitter _ on it. 

Richie, for his part, is dressed as a cowboy with as much authentic cowboy gear as he could find at various thrift stores over the past month. His hat is currently lopsided on his head while he sprawls in an armchair; Eddie is sitting in it with him, both of them a little too big to really be sharing the chair but stubborn enough to keep doing it anyway (even though Eddie keeps grousing that the tassels of Richie’s vest are tickling him). 

Eddie is dressed as a skeleton, which basically means he’s getting away with wearing a black onesie because it happens to have skeleton print on it. Richie thinks they all need to put in a _ little _more effort, but they’ve already pelted him with enough mini candy bars for complaining earlier. 

Richie finishes reading the last line of a chapter, using his most Dramatic Voice, and then shudders. “Christ alive, Big Bill. He sure doesn’t skimp on the gory details.”

“Yeah, I could really do with less vivid descriptions of entrails,” Eddie says, his voice muffled from his face being half-pressed into Richie’s neck. 

“Do you suppose he gets his ideas from the nightmares like all of you have?” Patty asks. 

“I’d hate to take a look in _ his _head if that’s true,” Richie says. “I mean, my subconscious scares the hell outta me, but it’s more…”

“A feeling,” Stan supplies. “Less… imagery.” 

Richie points at him. “Exactly.” He pats Eddie’s butt and says, “Get offa me, Kaspbrak, I want more candy and you’re crushing my nuts.”

“You’ve eaten half the damn bowl, Richie, you’re gonna make yourself sick,” Eddie says, but he clambers off of Richie anyway. Richie folds down the corner of the page in the book and tosses it onto the coffee table. He reaches for his empty scotch glass instead of the candy bowl.

“Anyone else want another?” he asks, wiggling the glass. Eddie and Patty both shake their heads, but Stan lifts his hand. Richie snags his glass from the table, too, and then heads into the kitchen to refill them.

A few moment later, he hears someone else come into the room, and turns to see Stan. His expression is oddly somber. He tucks his hands into his pockets and comes to stand beside Richie, watching him pour.

“You good, buddy?” Richie asks.

Stan hums noncommittally. Then he says, haltingly, “Do you ever — feel like we’re living on borrowed time?” 

Richie frowns. He sets the bottle of scotch back on the counter and tilts up his cowboy hat to look at Stan better. “Uh, no? What does that even mean?” 

Stan shakes his head. His gaze grows distant. “Sometimes I feel like… all of this, everything that’s happened since we moved away from Derry, it’s all just the eye of the storm. And when we go back into that storm… it scares the hell out of me, Richie.”

“Who says we’re going back into any storm?” Richie says, though Stan’s words have chilled him. He tries not to let his hand shake as he grabs his glass and takes a swig. 

Stan gives him a look, and there is more behind his eyes than Richie can possibly decipher. “We’re going to have to go back to Derry eventually. You know that, don’t you?”

And Richie does know it, the moment Stan says it. The thought of going back _ now _ still fills him with that same full-body flinch of a feeling, like returning is impossible, but — they _ will _go back, won’t they? They’ll have to. Why, he still doesn’t know, but he feels dread curdle in the pit of his stomach. The scar on his palm tingles.

“How do you know shit like that, man?” Richie asks, handing Stan his glass. “Why do you always remember so much more than Eds or me?” 

Stan shakes his head again. He takes a drink, and he wipes his mouth with the back of his trembling hand. “I don’t know,” he says hoarsely. “I just — do.” 

Richie starts to say, “Do you think it has to do with —” and then Eddie’s yelling for both of them to hurry the fuck up, what are they _ doing _in there, Richie better not have spilled booze all over the floor again — and the moment is gone. Stan’s shoulders relax and some color returns to his face, though the wry grin he shoots to Richie before they leave the kitchen looks a little forced. 

“Richie,” Patty says when they come back into the living room. “Eddie was just telling me that you’re doing standup now?”

“Oh. I mean, sort of,” Richie says, shrugging. “There’s this improv group I joined a few months ago. Back when I was living in LA, you know, I was trying to break into the comedy scene. I’m pretty set with the radio job, but I thought I’d give it a go again, see if anything happens.”

“You’ve got the right skill set for improv,” Stan says, nodding. “Loud _ and _obnoxious.” Richie flips him off.

He tries to put their conversation from the kitchen out of his mind for the rest of the night, as they all watch old scary movies and stay up too late. None of the cheap special effects could ever scare Richie as much as the haunted look on Stan’s face had. 

** _May 2013_ **

When Richie’s father passes away, no one is prepared for it — the time between his cancer diagnosis and his death was little more than a month. Richie’s mother has a wake at the Toziers’ house; Richie’s relatives and family friends shuffling around, dressed in black, speaking quietly. They touch his arm, his back, when he passes them. All the while Eddie holds his hand tightly and sticks close to his side.

Maggie comes up to them at one point and gives Eddie a long hug. “Thank you for being here,” she murmurs. Eddie’s eyes are big and sad when he hugs her back.

Richie feels all at once overwhelmed, too many people in the small space and too many eyes on him. The tie around his neck feels like it’s strangling him. “I’m gonna go to the bathroom,” he tells Eddie.

“Okay,” Eddie says. He searches Richie’s face for a moment, and Richie averts his eyes. Eddie can always read him too well. 

He hurries up the stairs and locks himself in the bathroom. Then he sits on the edge of the tub and tugs uselessly at the knot of his tie for a few seconds before just undoing it completely, letting it hang around his neck. He puts his elbows on his knees and rests his head in his hands, trying to focus on his breathing. It doesn’t feel quite real, that his dad is gone — like any second now, he’ll come tapping on the bathroom door with some bad approximation of one of Richie’s already terrible impressions. 

When he feels less like he’s about to have a panic attack in front of his entire extended family, he heads back down the stairs. He can hear his mother’s voice just around the corner, so he pauses to listen. She’s still with Eddie. 

“Went and I… we’ve always been so grateful that you two found each other again,” Maggie is saying. “Before you two reconnected, Richie — well, he was in a rough spot, I think. Drifting a little, aimless. He had his old radio job, but. I don’t know, we worried about him. And now we don’t — Went said to me recently that he didn’t worry about Richie getting into trouble anymore, because he knew you’d get him out of it.”

Eddie laughs softly. “Yeah, that sounds about right. Thank you, Maggie.” 

The sound of footsteps, and Richie backs away from the wall and sits down at the bottom of the stairs instead. Eddie rounds the corner and spots him. He looks relieved, and drops down onto the step beside him.

“Hey,” he says, rubbing Richie’s arm. “How’re you doing, honey?”

Richie raises an eyebrow. “Did you just call me ‘honey’?” 

“Yes?” Eddie says, frowning. “So?”

“I don’t think I’ve ever heard you use a term of endearment that didn’t double as an insult, that’s all.”

“I’m not going to call you an _ asshole _ at your father’s _ wake, _Richie!” Eddie hisses. “Jesus Christ.” He side-eyes him, then mutters, “Dumbass.”

The corner of Richie’s mouth twitches up, and Eddie knocks their shoulders together. It’s the closest Richie’s come to genuinely smiling all day. 

“My mom’s right, by the way,” he says. “I was a hot mess before I found you.”

“Oh, you heard that?” Eddie says.

“Yeah, I was eavesdropping.” Eddie gives him a look, and Richie shrugs. “You know right before I moved back here, I got in a bar fight? This dude gave me a nasty shiner, I couldn’t see out of my right eye for like, eight hours.” 

“You got a black eye?” Eddie says, sounding horrified. He reaches up and brushes the pads of his fingers over the skin below Richie’s right eye, as if the bruising would still be there after twelve years. 

“Yeah. It was my own fault, though. I was drunk and I _ definitely _started it.”

Eddie shakes his head, letting his hand trail down to cup Richie’s jaw instead. “I wish I’d been there. I would’ve taken care of you.”

His words put a lump in Richie’s throat, but he valiantly swallows it down and goes for a joke instead. “Yeah, I know. You probably would’ve won the fight, too. My little ball of rage,” he adds fondly.

Eddie indulges him with a brief smile, but continues earnestly, “I’m serious, though. I wish… I mean, god, Rich, we lost twelve years. I _ should’ve _been there back then. I should’ve remembered you.” His brows knit together in frustration. This is a familiar conversation, one they’ve had frequently over the past eleven years. Eddie leans in so he can rest his head against Richie’s shoulder. “You think we’re ever going to find the others?” 

“Yeah,” Richie says. And then, feeling a strange, powerful sense of conviction, he says, “Soon, I think.”

“Soon,” Eddie agrees faintly. Richie tilts his head down to kiss Eddie’s hair. 

** _June 2015_ **

The crowd of crying, joyous people outside Stonewall Inn envelops Richie and Eddie as they stand, listening to someone’s radio broadcasting news from D.C. that’s hard to hear over all the celebratory yelling. Richie hugs Eddie close to his side, smiling with a dazed sort of wonder. He never thought he’d be here, and he means that in a lot of ways — never thought he’d be hearing that gay marriage was legalized, never thought that he’d be able to stand, unafraid, in a crowd of obviously and openly gay people and not care if anyone saw him and knew. He presses a firm kiss to Eddie’s temple, and Eddie grabs his collar and drags him down into a proper kiss, though they’re both smiling so hard that their teeth clack together instead. 

Richie’s phone buzzes, and he pulls it out to glance at it. It’s a text from Stan. 

> **SU: **Congratulations 
> 
> **RT: **thanks man. singlehandedly carrying the gay rights movement on my shoulders has been a struggle, but it finally paid off
> 
> **SU: **You really do exhaust me, Richie
> 
> **SU: **I’m serious, though. I’m really happy for you. 
> 
> **RT: **yeah, yeah, i know. thanks, buddy 
> 
> **SU: **Should I start preparing a best man speech anytime soon? 

Richie barks out a laugh, startling Eddie. At his quizzical look, Richie tilts his phone so Eddie can read Stan’s text. When he’s done, Eddie’s eyes flick up to meet Richie’s again.

“So,” Richie says, nudging him. “You wanna?”

“That better not be your attempt at a marriage proposal or I’m going to kick you in the balls,” Eddie says. “Gimme a _ little _more romance than that. But also, you know what my answer will be.”

Richie beams, kissing him again. He can’t believe he gets to have this life, to have this man by his side for the past thirteen years. He can’t believe they found each other again. His mind drifts, as it does near-constantly, to the rest of his friends, who (besides Stan) still remain a mystery to him, locked behind the barriers of his memory. “We should wait,” he tells Eddie when they part. “Until everyone’s together again. Then we can get hitched.”

“Yeah,” Eddie says, smiling. “Yeah, that’ll be good. Soon, right?”

Richie nods, and tries to ignore the shiver of fear down his spine. This is a happy day, a happy moment, and they’re making happy plans for the future. He sees the flicker of fear in Eddie’s eyes too, even as they both continue to grin at each other and the celebration carries on around them. Soon, soon — Richie can feel time galloping toward something big and inevitable, and there is nothing he or Eddie or Stan will be able to do to stop it. 

** _October 2016_ **

Richie’s life has turned into something he never could have imagined — he’s currently standing backstage, about to go out to perform standup as the opening act for _ John Mulaney, _ of all people. He’d sort of given up on his standup dreams for nearly a decade, content to DJ and be the voice of an increasingly popular late-night radio broadcast. But Eddie had encouraged him to try out the improv group, and one thing led to another over the years and now he’s about to perform thirty minutes of comedy to a huge fucking theater full of people. And not just tipsy bar patrons who aren’t even listening to him — these people _ paid _to see him. Well, they paid to see Mulaney, but potato, potahto. 

Eddie is backstage with him, fussing over Richie’s blazer and giving John Mulaney an extremely unsubtle once-over every time he walks by. Richie flicks Eddie’s nose the third time he catches him doing it. “Quit checking out more famous comedians than me, you’ll hurt my ego.”

Eddie rolls his eyes and gives Richie a kiss, though his cheeks are slightly pink when he pulls back. “He’s wearing a suit,” Eddie says. “Should you be wearing a suit?” 

Richie pats Eddie’s cheek. “No, babe, that’s just his schtick. _ My _ schtick was supposed to be a Hawaiian shirt under my blazer, but _ somebody _had to veto it.”

“If you want me to have an ounce of respect for you, you will never try to dress yourself like that again,” Eddie says seriously. 

Richie’s about to respond, a smirk pulling at his mouth, when his phone goes off. He startles — it’s ten minutes until he’s supposed to go onstage. When he pulls out his phone, it’s an unknown number calling, but the location makes goosebumps erupt on his arms and the back of his neck: _ Derry, Maine. _

“Oh god,” Eddie whispers, clutching Richie’s arm. “Rich, what — what do we do? Should you answer it?”

“Obviously I have to answer it,” Richie says. He grabs Eddie’s hand and tugs him further backstage, to a quieter corner where no one else is loitering. Then he answers the phone and puts it on speaker, turning the volume down so he and Eddie have to lean in close to hear. “Hello?” he says. His heart is in his throat. 

“Richie? It’s Mike Hanlon, from Maine.”

“Mike,” Richie says. He laughs shakily, letting out all his breath. “Hey, man. You’re on speaker, Eddie’s here too.”

“He — Eddie? You’re with Eddie?” Mike sounds baffled. “I — Richie, do you know why I’m calling?” 

He does; it’s coming back slowly, but he can feel the barriers finally breaking down, allowing him to remember. His heart is pounding so hard and fast that he wonders if he’s about to have a heart attack and die. He’s abruptly terrified, and he can feel Eddie’s fingers digging into his bicep so hard he thinks they’ll leave bruises. 

Eddie is the one who says it, who breaks the silence. “It’s back,” he whispers. 

“Yes,” Mike says. “And, Eddie, Rich, I’m so sorry, but you have to come back, too.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i can already predict that i'll be adding at least one more chapter to this fic's total chapter count. derry is gonna be, as richie might say, a fuckin' doozy. 
> 
> thanks for reading! i really hope you liked this chapter, i had a lot of fun with these scenes and with stan!! leave me a comment if you so desire. see ya next time!


	4. PART FOUR: Derry (Walking tour)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello friends! i wrote 90% of this chapter in one sitting, i just Had to get it all out of me. you might notice i added two more chapters to the chapter count, and that is (as far as i know at this point) the final chapter count for this fic. we're gettin close to the end here folks!! 
> 
> i've made a couple executive decisions in changing plot points here, namely that the ritual of chud is not a native american ritual bc that whole plot point was uhhh racist and bad. i've also gotten rid of the storyline with bill and the kid because i just don't care enough tbh. anyway, i hope you enjoy my own bullshit explanations instead! 
> 
> CONTENT WARNINGS: homophobic language/slurs, blood/violence, and yes, more puking.

_ How long have we been here? _

_ Am I ever coming down? _

_ I need to find some lower thinking _

_ If I'm gonna stick around _

_ – The National, “I Am Easy to Find” _

**October 2016**

Richie stands on a big stage with lights shining hot and bright down on him, a long-awaited dream finally realized, and he can barely focus on anything besides the icy flood of terror that’s spreading from the pit of his stomach all the way up through his veins and into his throat. His delivery is off, and he doesn’t hit the punchlines quite right, and a lot of his jokes aren’t landing how he wants them to. He can’t even bring himself to care. He walks off stage like he’s on autopilot, and when he sees Mulaney’s expression from the wings, he knows he’s whiffed it, big time. 

“I know,” he says immediately, as soon as he’s backstage. He holds up his hands in defeat. “John, I am so sorry, man, I just got a call before I went up there, I —”

“Hey, it’s fine,” Mulaney says. “Your boyfriend told me. He said it was a family emergency.”

“Yeah,” Richie says faintly, and it’s then that he realizes Eddie isn’t standing backstage anymore. “Where is Eddie, anyway?”

“Green room,” Mulaney says, pointing. “He’s been in there since you got onstage, he was on the phone with someone.”

“Right. Thanks.” Richie shoots him double finger guns — and then cringes internally, because even in the midst of his fear haze he has enough self-awareness to realize that was a deeply uncool thing to do in front of John Mulaney — and jogs down the corridor to the green room. He’s a little disappointed that Eddie didn’t watch his set, but he knows he bombed anyway, and Eddie’s seen about a dozen better performances of those jokes in their living room the past few weeks. 

He pushes open the door and finds Eddie pacing, holding his phone up to his ear. He’s saying, “Stan, _ Stan, _we have to — I know. I know. But we made a promise, remember?” A pause, as he listens. Eddie’s eyes flick up and meet Richie’s, and he gives him a tight, anxious smile. Richie steps fully into the room and shuts the door behind him. He watches Eddie continue to pace and speak in aborted, half-formed sentences to Stan. After a moment, feeling itchy from not doing anything as the memories and the fear continue to trickle in, Richie pulls out his phone and texts Patty. 

> **RT: **hey
> 
> **PU: **Richie! Thank goodness. I’m guessing you got a call too?
> 
> **RT: **sure did. i fucking bombed my set thanks to it, but whatevs. how’s stan
> 
> **PU: **I’ve never seen him so scared. And he won’t tell me what he’s scared of. 
> 
> **RT: **honestly, pat, he might not remember what it is yet. eds and i don’t
> 
> **PU: **You should talk to him, Rich. 

Richie considers Patty’s message for a moment before catching Eddie’s eye and holding out his hand. Eddie frowns, and then says, “Hey, Richie wants to talk to you.” He passes the phone to Richie, still frowning.

Richie puts Eddie’s cell up to his ear. “Hey, Stan.”

“I don’t think I can do this, Richie,” Stan says immediately, and Richie has never heard his voice like this — breathless and quavering with fear. “I can’t — whatever it is, I can’t face it.”

“But you did,” Richie says. He sits down on one of the chairs in the green room. Eddie stays standing, watching him with crossed arms and a pinched expression. “You _ did _once before, and we were all together, and we won because of that.”

“If we had really won, we wouldn’t have to go back,” Stan says darkly. 

Richie winces — he has a point. But he knows in his heart that they all have to be together again if they have any hope of finishing what they started 27 years ago. “Okay, listen, here’s my plan. You and Patty get the next flight here to New York, and then Eds and I will get us a flight to Maine and we can go together, how’s that?”

“I am _ not _bringing Patty anywhere near that fucking place,” Stan says, his voice growing so instantly firm and angry that Richie startles. 

“Of fucking course you’re not,” he retorts. “She can’t come anyway, she’s not…” _ Not one of us, not one of the seven, _he thinks but doesn’t say. He doesn’t need to say it; Stan knows. “Look, this is entirely for selfish reasons, okay, I just want her to be there when we get back. I like your wife more than I like you, Stanley, you should know that by now.” When Stan doesn’t respond, Richie presses, “C’mon, we have to go so we can see Bill and yell at him for not replying to my email like a decade ago.”

At that, Stan huffs out a shaky laugh. “We have to tell him how much his endings suck.”

_ “Yes,” _Richie says emphatically. “So you’re coming?”

“I… yeah. Yeah, I’ll come.” He can hear Stan swallow roughly. “I’ll text you our flight info in a bit. Rich…” He pauses. There is only the sound of breathing between them. “See you soon, I guess,” Stan says eventually. He hangs up.

Richie pulls the phone away from his ear and looks at it for a moment before he stands up and hands it back to Eddie. Eddie doesn’t look away from Richie’s face, shoving his phone back into his pocket before stepping forward and pulling Richie into a crushing hug. Richie’s arms go around him instinctively.

“I’m sorry I missed your set,” Eddie says into the fabric of Richie’s blazer.

“It’s fine. I bombed anyway.”

Eddie tilts his head back so he can look up at Richie and frown. “Don’t say that. I bet you were great.”

“No, man, I’m being serious. Mulaney looked at me like I had two heads when I walked offstage.” 

“Shit, Rich, I’m sorry,” Eddie says. He smooths a hand up and down Richie’s back. 

Richie laughs, feeling a bit hysterical. There’s a tiny part of his brain that’s not focused on Derry, and it’s wondering if he just flubbed his one chance at a comedy career before it even started. But he can’t think about that now — there will be time for mourning his dreams after they’ve finished… whatever is waiting for them in Maine.

It’s the middle of the night when Stan and Patty arrive at Richie and Eddie’s apartment, and they have about four hours before they need to head to the airport to catch the flight Eddie booked for himself, Richie, and Stan to get to Bangor. From there, they’ll drive down to Derry. Richie’s palms sweat when he thinks about what comes after that. Dinner with the friends he’s spent the past 15 years trying to remember again, that’s what. Mike texted the restaurant name to him after he’d ended the initial phone call. Richie keeps staring at it — _ Jade of the Orient, 6pm reservation _ — and tries to imagine what it’ll feel like to see everyone again. 

They spend the four hours huddled together on Richie and Eddie’s bed, like kids at a sleepover. None of them sleep. Stan looks miserably afraid, but he doesn’t say much, just holds onto Patty like she’s the only thing anchoring him. Patty speaks softly, mostly to Eddie, the two of them making stilted small talk and avoiding the looming spectre of Derry. Richie tucks his face against the bony warmth of Eddie’s shoulder and lets the haze of nauseating fear settle over him like a blanket. 

Patty drives them to the airport when it’s time. She hugs all of them tightly, one by one. When she gets to Richie, he pecks her cheek and murmurs, “We’ll look out for him, make sure he gets home safe.”

“I know,” she says, squeezing his hand. “You better do the same for you and Eddie, you hear me? I want all my boys back in one piece.”

Richie’s heart swells with love for her. He tosses off a salute and says, “Yes, ma’am,” and she laughs, but he can see the worry in her eyes. He gets it — he’s fucking worried, too.

She hugs Stan last, holding him close for a long time before kissing him soundly. “I love you,” Patty says. “I’ll see you soon.”

“I love you,” Stan replies. His voice is hoarse. It sounds like a goodbye. When they finally move away to get in the TSA line, Stan looks like he’s marching to his death. Richie turns around, just once, to see Patricia still watching them from the spot where they’d left her. She has a hand over her mouth, and when he catches her eye, she bows her head and looks away. 

On the plane, they’re seated with Stan at the window and Eddie at the aisle, Richie wedged in between them. Eddie always insists on the aisle seat, because he has to pee at least three times every flight he goes on, but this time he’s taken a Xanax and conks the fuck out before they’ve even taken off, his head lolling slightly on his neck pillow. Richie keeps a firm hold on Eddie’s hand, shifting uncomfortably as he tries to adjust his too-long legs in the small space. He closes his eyes through takeoff, feeling the swoop in his stomach as they ascend. 

Richie looks at Eddie, who is still sound asleep. His mouth is slightly open, and he’s making the soft, whistling snores that Richie fucking adores. Richie lifts his free hand to smooth a stray strand of hair back from Eddie’s temple, and then he brushes his thumb over Eddie’s warm skin. His chest feels tight with too many emotions, and he has to look away. He glances over at Stan, who is staring out the window listlessly. Richie reaches over to grab Stan’s hand, squeezing it. Stan squeezes back, tearing his gaze away from the clouds outside to give Richie a weary but genuine smile. 

“You doing okay, Stan the Man?” Richie asks.

Stan’s smile turns into a grimace. “You think Eddie has any more Xanax?” 

Richie releases Stan’s hand and bends down to fish around in the carryon backpack stowed in front of Eddie’s seat. He eventually retrieves Eddie’s medication bag and passes Stan the Xanax bottle. “Knock yourself out. Literally. You’re lucky it’s a short flight or I’d be bullying one of you to stay awake with me.” 

It’s less than two hours to Bangor. For all he’s impatiently awaited this reunion, Richie finds himself wishing time would slow down. Instead, it seems to rush by, with Eddie snoring softly on his left and Stan sleeping restlessly against the window to his right. Richie watches through the little window as the plane starts its descent, and tries not to think about how it feels like descending into the jaws of hell. 

They spend the few hours between when they arrive in Derry and when they’re supposed to meet everyone at the restaurant trying to sleep at the inn. No one else is there when they arrive — the whole place seems kind of deserted, but Richie can’t imagine many people come to stay in fucking Derry — so they lug their suitcases up to their rooms and then Stan disappears into his own, while Eddie and Richie curl up on the lumpy, dusty mattress together and pretend to sleep. 

When they’d driven past the _ Welcome to Derry _sign, Richie’s heart had leapt to his throat, but here inside the inn where he has no childhood memories, it almost feels like he’s not really back home. He’s afraid to let himself sleep, though, afraid of what being back will do to his nightmares. 

Richie thinks Jade of the Orient must be a newer restaurant, because he doesn’t remember it being there when he was a kid, but he and his friends never went out to eat at an actual nice restaurant anyway. He, Eddie, and Stan all stand outside the door for a long moment, listening to the tinny music playing from inside, the muffled voices. 

“Anyone else shitting themselves?” Richie asks casually. He grabs Eddie’s hand.

Stan blows out a long breath. “Let’s just go.” He steps forward and pushes open the door. Richie and Eddie follow, still holding hands. 

The server leads them to the back, where Mike’s reserved a big table for them. Richie can hear voices as they approach, and his heart pounds, his right palm tingling. Eddie’s hand squeezes his fingers, so tight it almost hurts. They round the corner, and four people are standing around by the table. Richie knows them all instantly: Beverly, tucking her short red hair behind her ear as she leans in to look at the fish tank along the wall; Ben, standing beside her, watching her face with a soft expression that Richie remembers all too well from childhood; Bill and Mike, speaking in low voices, Mike’s hand on Bill’s arm. None of them have noticed the new arrivals yet, and Eddie and Stan both seem too overwhelmed to say anything.

Richie clears his throat. “Sorry, I didn’t realize this was the hot people convention. I’m looking for some scrawny weirdos from the Losers Club?” The name slips out of his mouth for the first time in nearly three decades, and he grins as he says it. It doesn’t hurt anymore to remember it, he realizes — these are his friends, his family, his favorite fucking losers, and all he feels is an intense sense of relief to see them. 

The others turn at the sound of his voice, and for a moment everything is a chaotic mess of exclaimed greetings and shuffling over embrace each other. Richie lets go of Eddie’s hand so he can hug Bill.

“Denbrough! Your endings suck!” Richie exclaims as Bill’s arms lock around him. Somewhere to his right, he hears Stan laugh. Bill thwacks him on the arm when he pulls away.

“Fuck you, Trashmouth,” he says with no heat, beaming. “When the fuck did you get so tall? I don’t like it.”

_ “Thank _ you, that’s what I’ve been saying for years,” Eddie says. He’s in the middle of being squeezed tightly by Ben, and he pats Ben’s shoulder gingerly. “Bro, you’re _ ripped, _what’s happening right now?” 

“Years?” Bill repeats. He looks from Eddie to Richie, his brow furrowing. “Hey, wait, were you two holding hands when you came in?”

Richie’s stomach drops. He hasn’t felt this nervous about being out in a long time, but it rushes back all too easily. “Bill, if you grew up to be a homophobe I’ll never forgive you,” he says, carefully keeping his voice steady and casual. 

Bill looks alarmed. “What? No! I just — I didn’t know you were — did you two just figure this out in the parking lot or something?”

“God, no, can you imagine?” Richie laughs, relieved. He shouldn’t have even worried — these are his friends, the only real friends he’s ever had, of course they’re going to accept him. “Nah, Eds and I have been together since, shit, 2002? I found a letter from him at my parents’ house and I figured out he lived in New York so I said his name on my radio show every night until he finally heard it and called me. Then I had to have a gay crisis but we got our shit together eventually. Been together ever since!” He smiles, throwing an arm around Eddie’s shoulders and pulling him in close, before looking back up at his friends. His smile falters. “Why is everyone looking at me like this?” 

“You called his name on the radio every night?” Ben says finally. “That’s….”

“Please don’t get him started,” Stan says. “Or else Richie will never shut up about how much of a romantic he is. It’s unbearable.”

“Don’t be jealous because my love story is more cinematic than yours will ever be, Uris,” Richie quips. Stan rolls his eyes. 

“Sorry, does this mean you’ve been around Stan before tonight, too?” Mike interjects. “I… don’t understand. How? Did you remember him somehow?”

“Not exactly.” Richie fishes around in his pants pocket until he pulls out his wallet, where he keeps the polaroid and Eddie’s letter tucked inside. He takes out the photo and presents it to the rest of the group. “I found this, so I knew everyone’s first names, but it took some digging to find enough information to get in touch with these two. I _ tried _to get ahold of you too, Bill, but your agent never got back to me. Very rude.” 

Beverly takes the photo from him and looks at it. Then she looks back up. “So you found this, and you… remembered? Just like that?”

“Bits and pieces,” Richie says. “Not just because of the photo, either. Especially once Eds and I were back together, weird things would trigger it all the time. That never happened to any of you?” 

Ben startles slightly, and then he takes out his own wallet and pulls out a folded, aged piece of paper. Richie sees Bev’s handwriting and recognizes it as a yearbook page. Ben, for all that he’s grown up to be like, supermodel hot, is blushing in a way that makes him look thirteen again. “I’ve had this for years,” he says. He glances at Bev and then away. “Sometimes I’d get this… like an itch in the back of my mind?” 

“Dude,” Richie says. “That has her _ full name _on it, you didn’t ever think to look her up and like, email her or something?”

Ben flushes deeper. “I _ did _think about it, but whenever I thought about it for too long it made me feel really sick, so I didn’t do anything. Figured it was a sign from the universe. Did you not… get that?” He looks a little dejected at the thought of some cosmic force targeting him specifically. 

“Oh, dude, no, I threw up so often Eddie thought my stomach acid was going to burn a hole through my esophagus, but I just fucking powered through anyway. I’ve been trying to find you idiots for years.” Everyone is still staring at him, and he starts to squirm under the scrutiny. He didn’t think it was that weird — anyway, since when has _ he _ ever been one to heed signs from the universe? 

Probably sensing his discomfort, Eddie says loudly, “Are we gonna sit the fuck down, or are we going to just stand around the table like weirdos?” 

They settle in around the table, all seven of them, and for a little while things ease into a comfortable familiarity. They catch up, and Richie learns that his friends have, in addition to becoming insanely hot, become stupidly successful in their fields. Eddie fucking _ yelps _ when he realizes Beverly’s a founder of _ Rogan & Marsh, _ where he apparently purchases most of his work wardrobe — Richie doesn’t pay attention to brand names. He does notice that Bev isn’t wearing a wedding ring, and when Bill asks her something about her husband, her smile tightens and her eyes go very bright before she abruptly changes the subject. Richie taps her foot under the table and shoots her a concerned look, and she taps his foot back and shakes her head just slightly, her smile softening. 

Eventually, Ben says, “So Mike, I don’t get it. How come we didn’t remember anything but you were able to remember and call us?”

Mike sets down his chopsticks. His expression grows somber. “Something happens when you leave Derry,” he says quietly. “You… forget. But I never left, so I remember everything. All of it, what happened that summer. Now that you’re all here… you’re going to start remembering, too. I can’t tell you much though — you have to remember it for yourselves.”

The energy around the table instantly shifts, a blanket of unease settling over all of them. Richie’s mind aches with almost-knowing. Something bad, something _ Bad _ in the cold and the dark of the sewers, in the dank and the dust of the old house… the house on Neibolt Street, oh _ fuck — _

“Pennywise,” Beverly whispers.

“Oh god, the fucking clown,” Eddie says. He clutches the edge of the table, knuckles white, and Richie grabs his wrist. _ Pennywise, IT, the clown with yellow eyes and razor teeth, the creature from every nightmare Richie’s ever had, from every nightmare _ anyone’s _ ever had… _

In the center of the table, the bowl of fortune cookies starts to rattle. Beside Richie, Stan whimpers. 

Bill shoves his chair back and stands up. “Mike, what the f-f-fffuck is that,” he says in a low voice. He looks alarmed by both the cookies and his own stuttering. Mike just shakes his head, staring at the cookies with terrified eyes. 

The cookies start leaping out of the bowl like crickets, popping open, and _ things _start spilling out. Black ooze that sparks and sizzles on the tablecloth, bugs and maggots, creatures that should only exist in nightmares start writhing and crawling on the table, and all of them scream and scramble out of their seats. Richie shoves Eddie behind him, and feels Eddie clutching the back of his jacket and whimpering “I want to go home, I want to go home” over and over. 

“It’s not real!” Mike yells. Behind him, in the fish tanks, floating corpse heads are singing along to the overhead music. Richie can barely breathe. “Listen to me, it’s not real!” Mike picks up a chair and starts beating the shit out of the table, smashing the plates and the black ooze and the nightmare creatures. He does it over and over until the server rounds the corner.

“Is everything alright?” she says, alarmed. Mike stops. Richie blinks, and he can suddenly both see and _ not _see the horror show splayed out on the table. He remembers the blood in Beverly’s bathroom, how her father apparently couldn’t see it. 

“Yeah, could we get the check?” he says, forcing a smile. She nods, staring at them all suspiciously before backing out of the room. Richie’s smile drops and he turns back to the rest of them. 

Bill is backed up against the wall with his arms lifted to protect himself. Beverly has her face in her hands. Ben is holding onto Stan’s shirtsleeve, and they both look very pale. Mike, breathing hard, sets the chair back down on the floor. 

“Well,” Richie says. “Think if we leave her a big enough tip we won’t get a lifetime ban?” 

“I’m never fucking eating here again,” Eddie wheezes, his face pressed into Richie’s back. 

They end up standing around in the parking lot while Mike, the only one of them who actually lives here and might know some of the people, tries to bullshit his way out of explaining the mess they made. At least Bill had the decency to pay for the meal with one of his many credit cards. 

Eddie, still looking white and shaken, sits down on the hood of their rental car and hugs his arms around himself. Richie starts to make his way over to him when he’s stopped by Bev, who grabs his arm. He glances down at her, eyebrows raised.

“What’s up, buttercup?” he asks.

“Can I talk to you for a second?” she says. He nods, frowning, and Bev glances around before saying in a quiet voice, “Rich, do you remember that day, after we fought IT, when we made the oath?”

“Yeah, of course,” he says. He can picture the way the sun made them all look a little golden, remembers how the grass was overgrown and brushed against his bare legs. He remembers the way Bev’s face had barely twitched when Bill sliced the glass through her palm. 

“Remember how I told you all what I saw in the Deadlights? That vision of us, but older?” she asks. He nods again. “That’s not all I saw. Or, it was, that day, but ever since… I have dreams. Nightmares. And I see — I’ve seen all of us —” She breaks off, looking down at the ground and letting out a shuddering breath. “Richie, I’ve seen things about how all of this is supposed to go, and you finding Eddie before tonight was not one of them.”

His frown deepens. “What are you talking about?”

“None of us were supposed to see each other again before tonight,” Bev says. She shakes her head a little. “You changed the way things were meant to be somehow.”

“Am I supposed to apologize?” Richie says, crossing his arms defensively. “Eddie’s — he’s the love of my fucking life, Bev, and I’m not sorry.” 

“Of course not,” Beverly says. She puts her hand on his arm and he relents, holding himself less stiffly. “Richie, I’m so happy that you found each other again. I’m honestly jealous of you two, and Stan. It’s been… a hard 27 years.” She smiles grimly. Richie thinks again about her lack of a wedding ring. He’s noticed, too, the bruises on her wrist and arm. “I just hope we can still do what we’re meant to do, now that things have changed,” she continues.

“Have you seen what happens, in your dreams? How this all… ends?” Richie asks. He’s not sure if he really wants to know, and he’s relieved when she shakes her head. “Well, then it’s fine. Right?”

“I hope so,” she says again. 

Mike comes out of the restaurant then, and he looks relieved that they’re all still there. “Well, we’re not welcome in this establishment again, but I think that was a given,” he says. “We should go back to the inn. I’m sure you have some questions —”

“Yeah, I’ve got one: what the fuck, Mike?” Stan exclaims, his voice shaking. “What the hell did you mean, we have to remember everything ourselves? What else do you know that you aren’t telling us?” 

“I… I can answer some things,” Mike says, holding up his hands. “But not here.” 

There’s still no one in the inn, not even an employee, so they sit around the lobby area while Mike explains. Richie is sitting with Eddie wedged next to him in an armchair, Bev sitting on the arm of it, while Stan, Ben, and Bill sit on the small couch. Mike stands before them, pacing. He’s brought a backpack with him, but he hasn’t opened it yet, just keeps glancing at it. 

“I’ve been doing research for years, talking to everyone in this town, reading all the old books in the library, any information I could find,” he says. He looks over at Ben. “You probably don’t remember, but before you moved… all your Derry research, you packed it in a box and gave it to me. And I’ve found more since then — a lot more.”

“About missing kids?” Ben asks.

“About IT,” Mike says. They all shudder. Eddie grips Richie’s arm. “I found stories — legends — about when IT came here, to Derry. I can show you.” He grabs his backpack and pulls out a thick leather-bound book with yellowed pages. The embossed cover reads _ Night’s Truth. _“Here. It talks about a meteor coming to Earth, but it wasn’t a normal meteor. Where it hit, the earth shattered upward and stayed that way.”

“Floating,” Bill breathes. 

“Did you say a meteor?” Ben says. “From space?”

“Well, more like from another dimension,” Mike says. “But essentially, yes.”

Beside him, Richie feels Eddie stiffen. He starts to turn to look at him, a grin spreading helplessly across his face, and Eddie is already saying, “No. _ No. _ Shut the _ fuck _ up, Tozier, I’ll fucking end you.” 

“I didn’t even say anything,” Richie says. He’s fucking _giddy. _Eddie’s face is all scrunched up and he’s turning red. 

“It’s from fucking _ space?!” _Eddie yells, flinging his arms in the air. Everyone stares at him, alarmed. “It’s a fucking alien?! Are you kidding me!” 

“I _ fucking told you!” _ Richie says, cackling. “Ohhh, Eds, you owe me at _ least _fifty bucks at this point. Holy shit, I can’t wait to tell Pat, she’s gonna flip.” He looks over at Stan, still grinning like a lunatic, but his smile fades when he sees Stan’s grim expression. “Dude, what?”

“We’re going to die,” Stan says, matter-of-fact. “You realize that, don’t you? We’re all going to die, and you’re not going to get to tell my wife _ anything, _ because we’re going to have to face a _ monster from outer space, _and you think we have a chance? I’m a fucking accountant, Richie! You sit in a DJ booth for a living!”

“Okay, and we fought it when we were _ thirteen, _ jackass, and we all fucking lived then,” Richie says. “Shouldn’t it be _ easier _now?”

“No!” Stan says, with such conviction that it actually startles Richie into silence. “No, Richie, it fucking won’t be.” He puts his head in his hands. Ben wraps his arm around Stan’s shoulders. The levity drains from Richie immediately, and he looks away, twisting his fingers together in his lap. Stan knows more than he’s letting on, Richie thinks, in the same way that Beverly knows more than the rest of them. 

“We can beat IT,” Mike says quietly. He sets the book down. “This didn’t just tell me where IT came from. There are legends… stories of rituals to defeat beings like this, they come from all cultures. In the book they call it the Ritual of Chüd.”

“The ritual of _ what?” _Richie says. 

Mike ignores him, pulling something else out of his backpack. It’s a leather, boxy container with a round lid. “The ritual needs all of us for it to work. We have to go to where IT lives, and we have to provide a sacrifice.”

“Excuse me?!” Eddie yelps.

“Not like that,” Mike says. “It’s… metaphorical.” He explains — they’ll all need to find tokens, items that represent their lost memories and the time in Derry that was taken from them. Then they have to burn them in the weird container, which Mike apparently made himself by following instructions in the book. He tells them about the 27-year cycle, which Richie vaguely remembers Ben and Bill talking about when they were kids. 

“It started up again a few weeks ago,” Mike says. “I wasn’t sure it was really happening at first, but then a young man and his boyfriend were attacked, at the festival the other night. One of them was thrown off the bridge, and — IT killed him. When I went to the bridge, IT had left a message for me.” He pulls a deflated red balloon out of his pocket. 

Richie’s blood runs cold. “Pennywise attacked two gay kids?” he asks hoarsely.

“No, some assholes in town did. Pennywise just showed up in the aftermath, like he always does,” Mike says darkly. By the time he’s done explaining, and everyone’s asked about a million questions, sunrise is starting to bleed in through the windows. None of them have slept, but no one seems especially eager to catch a few z’s before embarking on their token hunt. 

Mike drops a bombshell right as they’re getting to their feet, ready to leave the inn. “You all need to go alone.” 

“Uh, _ fuck _that,” Richie says. “Splitting up is like, textbook definition stupid.”

“Yeah, what are we, Scooby fucking Doo?” Eddie exclaims. “I just _ know _Richie and I are the Scooby-Shaggy team in that scenario, and I’m not about to get chased through an endless door maze by a killer clown. No thank you.” 

“I’m sorry, but you have to,” Mike says. “It’s part of the ritual.”

“W-we should do what he says, guys,” Bill says. “We h-h-have to do this right. We won’t get another chance at this.” 

“Christ,” Richie mutters. He side-eyes Eddie, and then says, “Alright, fine. You’re all very stupid, but fine.” He makes a grand show of dropping Eddie’s hand, raising his arms in the air. “Can we go now?” 

“Meet up at the library by six tonight,” Mike says. “You have my number if anything… happens. I’ll see you all soon.”

“I fucking hope so,” Eddie mutters under his breath. 

Everyone walks out of the inn, stepping into the pink light of early morning. They all split off, Bev and Bill with determined expressions on their faces, Ben a little more uncertain as he picks a direction seemingly at random and walks off. Richie waits until Mike’s back is turned, walking away in the direction of the library, before he slings an arm around Eddie’s shoulders.

“So we’re definitely not splitting up,” Richie says. “Fuck that noise.”

“Oh thank god,” Eddie says, sagging against him. “I really thought you were going to make me do this shit alone, I was so pissed.” 

“Not a chance, shortstack. Anyway, I don’t need to go sacrifice-hunting. I know what my token is already.” He pulls out his wallet and tugs at the corner of Eddie’s letter.

“You’re gonna burn that?” Eddie says, frowning.

Richie smiles sadly. “I mean, it wouldn’t be a sacrifice if it didn’t hurt a little, Eds.” He puts his wallet away again. “Oh shit, we should find Stan. He can just use the bird book, I brought it.”

“Well what the hell am I gonna use?” Eddie demands, as he and Richie start walking in the direction they’d seen Stan going. “I don’t have anything.”

“We’ll find you something,” Richie assures him. He sees Stan a couple blocks ahead of them and removes his arm from Eddie’s shoulders so he can jog closer. “Hey, Stan! Wait up!” 

Stan whirls around, alarmed, and then he frowns at them. “We’re supposed to go alone, what are you two doing?”

“I already have my token, and we’ve got something for you, too,” Richie says. “So come with us to find Eddie’s. I _ know _you don’t want to go alone.”

“I…” Stan shifts from foot to foot. “Okay, fine.” 

“Nice,” Richie says. The three of them fall into step together, walking down the road and glancing in shop windows, trying to see if anything sparks a memory for Eddie. It all feels eerily familiar, like it hasn’t been nearly three decades since Richie lurked these streets. It feels like it all could’ve happened yesterday. Old cracks in the sidewalk he used to trip over, dips in the asphalt he’d learned to avoid catching his bike tires on, they’re all still there. It’s like Derry’s been frozen in time, waiting for them to come back. 

“Oh shit, they shut this place down?” Stan says. Richie pulls his eyes away from the ground and realizes they’ve come to a stop in front of the arcade. The windows are papered over, the marquee missing letters and stained from weather and age. Richie stares at himself in the dirty reflection of the glass. God, how many days had he spent in there, going to the movies with his friends or clambering into the photo booth, spending all his allowance on tokens for Street Fighter —

A memory crashes over him. His reflection is suddenly himself at thirteen, smaller and scrawnier and with big, terrified eyes behind his glasses. 

_ He misses his friends even if he’s pissed at all of them for putting Eddie in danger — it wasn’t really their fault, wasn’t Bill’s, but Eddie’s arm is broken and he’s basically under house arrest, and Richie has to blame _ someone _ for this bullshit. Well, someone besides the stupid fucking clown. _

_ So he’s alone, at the arcade, and it’s all Bill’s fault. But then a kid Richie’s never seen before asks to play against him, and Richie says yes immediately, because the kid has curly hair and nice eyes and Richie’s palms are sweaty. He tries valiantly to be cool, but he can’t help the way his touch lingers, the painfully awkward way he asks if the boy wants to play again. _

_ And then — fucking _ Bowers _ is there, and he’s screaming at Richie, calling him a fairy, a faggot, and Richie’s skin is on fire, everyone in the arcade is staring at him and now they all _ know. _ His voice has abandoned him, maybe for the first time in his life, and he just turns and runs out of the arcade. He misses Eddie horribly, and he is disgusted with himself for it. _

“Richie?” Eddie’s voice cuts through the memory, shaking him back into the present day. He blinks, and his reflection is himself as he is now: forty years old, taller and more worn at the edges. The terror in his eyes, though — that hasn’t changed.

“Richie,” Eddie says again, concerned. “Hey, you okay?” He reaches out to take Richie’s hand, and Richie jerks back. Eddie stares at him. “What is going on with you right now?”

“I — we — it’s not safe,” Richie manages. His chest feels so tight he can hardly breathe. He wonders if this is how Eddie felt when he thought he had asthma. “You heard what Mike said, Eddie, a gay couple got attacked here like, a few days ago. It’s not fucking safe.” 

“I…” Eddie’s jaw clenches, and he looks down and away. He’s upset, Richie knows it. Richie’s fucking upset too, because he can feel himself backsliding into the panic and hiding that he’d spent years of his life unlearning. It shouldn’t be this easy to fall right back into that old fear, but it is. “Okay, fine,” Eddie says. He shoves his hands in the pockets of his jacket instead. “Fine. I thought of a place we can go, anyway.” He starts walking without waiting for Richie or Stan to reply. 

Stan touches Richie’s arm, and Richie flinches. Stan’s eyebrows shoot up. “Rich, what’s wrong?”

“Let’s go,” Richie mutters. He follows after Eddie, Stan right behind him. 

They end up at Keene’s drugstore, which makes sense. Eddie spent a hell of a lot of his childhood picking up prescriptions and inhalers from the pharmacy. Eddie puts his hand on the door, and then pauses. 

“I should go inside alone, I think,” he says. “I’m just going to get my inhaler and then I’ll be back.”

“Are you sure?” Richie asks miserably. He feels like Eddie’s mad at him. 

“Yeah, I’m sure. I’ll be right back.” Eddie looks through the glass door with grim determination, and then he pushes it open and disappears inside. 

Stan glances around and then nods in the direction of a bench beside the building. “You want to sit?” he asks. Richie shrugs, and the two of them drop onto the bench and sit there in silence. Richie doesn’t want Stan to ask why he’s being weird, because he’s ashamed of himself enough as it is. He hears Stan inhale, preparing to speak, and winces.

“I don’t think I’d be here if it weren’t for you and Eddie,” Stan says, which is definitely _ not _what Richie was expecting.

“Oh,” Richie says slowly. “Um, sorry?”

“No, Richie, I mean. If you two hadn’t found me and… if I hadn’t had you guys in my life again for the past decade. When Mike called, I really think I would’ve…” He breaks off, his voice cracking, and rubs his fingers absently along his wrist. Richie watches the motion for a few seconds before it clicks, what Stan’s implying.

“Dude, _ no,” _Richie says. Stan looks up at him, his eyes wet. “You — you wouldn’t do that. You wouldn’t have done that to Patty, come on.”

Stan shakes his head. He scrubs at his eye for a moment and exhales slowly. “When we fought IT, the first time, and I — I got separated from you all. And that thing had me, had my whole head in its mouth…” He swallows, throat bobbing. “Those lights from my dreams, Rich, that’s where they came from. The Deadlights, just like Beverly. I’ve seen what was supposed to happen to me, and I was supposed to die.”

Richie is, all at once, completely fed up. “Stan, just fucking stop and think for a second. Who gave you and Bev those visions, huh?”

“The Deadlights,” Stan says, like Richie’s the one being stupid.

“Right, and where do the Deadlights come from? The fucking clown! Whose sole purpose in life is to scare the shit out of us! Why are you taking anything you see in those visions as a fact and not just IT trying to fuck with you? It’s bullshit, man. I say we make our own rules here.” 

Stan doesn’t look entirely convinced, but before he or Richie can say anything else, the door to the drugstore flies open and Eddie bursts out, shaking and covered in a viscous black sludge. Stan and Richie jump to their feet immediately. Whatever’s on Eddie, it reeks like bile and sewage.

“What the fuck happened!” Richie exclaims.

“I — I remembered — downstairs, in the pharmacy basement,” Eddie is stammering, his hands shaking. He’s clutching a prescription bag in one fist. “That summer, I heard — my mom, whatever, it doesn’t matter, I went down there and the fucking leper was there, and I — it puked on me.”

_ “That’s _what that is?” Stan says. He clamps a hand over his mouth and nose. 

“Eddie, Jesus,” Richie says, he steps forward, trying to take Eddie’s hand, but Eddie pulls away.

“Don’t, man, I’m covered in puke.”

“Then I’ll wash my hand later,” Richie says, and grabs Eddie’s hand anyway. It’s disgusting and slimy, but he squeezes it hard, reassuring. 

Eddie looks down at their linked hands, then back into Richie’s face. His eyes are big and dark. The leper puke is matted into his hair, smeared into his eyebrows. He looks fucking miserable. “I thought you said it wasn’t safe,” he says. 

“Clearly we’re not safe either way,” Richie says, gesturing to him. Eddie huffs out a weak, humorless laugh. “Let’s go back to the inn so you can take a shower. You stink, Kaspbrak.”

“Oh, _ thank _ you for letting me know,” Eddie snaps, already walking and dragging Richie along beside him. Stan walks a couple feet behind them, still covering his nose and mouth. “I had _ no idea _ this fucking _ alien clown barf _smelled bad.” 

Eddie bitches the entire walk back to the inn, which Richie really can’t blame him for. When they step inside, Ben and Beverly are sitting on the stairs, clearly in the middle of some serious conversation. They break off when the door opens, and when they catch sight of Eddie they leap to their feet. 

“What _ happened?” _Bev asks.

“Nothing, I’m fine, everything’s fine,” Eddie mutters, pushing past them to trudge up the stairs. Richie lingers behind, catching Ben and Beverly’s alarmed gazes. 

“He had a little, uh, encounter with our clown friend at the pharmacy,” Richie explains. 

“He’s not the only one,” Bev says, folding her arms across her chest. She’s holding a postcard in her hand, and Richie vaguely remembers seeing it in Ben’s backpack, that first day they’d all hung out at the quarry. 

“What did you see?” Stan asks.

Beverly just shakes her head. “Something I wish I hadn’t.” She frowns, glancing between them. “Were you three together? Mike said to go alone.”

“And what Mikey doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” Richie says. Beverly gives him a stern look. 

“Richie, you really need to take this more seriously,” she says. 

“I am! This is me being serious!” Richie exclaims.

Above them, there’s a sudden banging sound, and then Eddie screams, _ “Richie!” _

Richie’s blood turns to fucking ice, and he’s bounding up the stairs before he’s even fully processed what’s happening. He hears the others close behind him. He skids to a stop when he reaches the second floor and sees Eddie edging along the wall beside the door to their room. He’s done a sloppy job of wiping the puke from his face, but Richie’s more concerned with the _ blood _that’s now spilling down his left cheek and along his neck. Behind Richie, Beverly screams.

“What the fuck!” Richie says, rushing over to him. Eddie slides down the wall until he’s sitting on the floor. 

“Bowers is in my room,” he says, blood pouring out of his mouth as he does so. He lifts a hand absently to wipe at it, like he’s just drooling on himself and not bleeding out of his fucking face. Richie is on his feet again in an instant, throwing himself into the room with a white-hot anger searing through his chest. That motherfucker — Richie’s going to _ kill _him. 

There’s a trail of blood that leads into the bathroom, where the door is swung open. Richie steps inside, but there’s no one there, just more blood. He hears Ben storming in behind him and stopping short when he sees the empty room. The bathroom window is smashed, and when Richie looks outside, he sees none other than Henry fucking Bowers, staggering on the street below with the shower curtain pinned to his chest by his own knife. He looks up, and makes eye contact with Richie. 

_ “Get the fuck out of here, faggot!” Henry had yelled, and Richie felt like he was falling into a fucking void. It took him weeks to brave the arcade again, and when he did he could feel everyone’s eyes on him, making the back of his neck prickle. He never offered to play against anyone again, and what was worse, no one asked. They all knew what he was now, didn’t they? A dirty little freak. He was glad, in a terrible sort of way, that Eddie was locked away in his house all summer, so he wouldn’t find out. _

Bowers, still making eye contact, pulls the knife from his chest and lets the shower curtain flutter to the ground. He blows Richie a kiss, and then, cackling, he jumps into the passenger seat of his old car and it rockets away down the road. 

“Son of a bitch,” Ben says from behind him. Richie turns away from the window, suppressing a shudder. “How the hell is he still alive? I thought Mike pushed him down the well!” 

“I don’t even know anymore, man,” Richie says. He scrubs a hand through his hair and hurries back out of the room, back to Eddie.

Beverly is kneeling beside Eddie on the floor, her hands gently cupping his face so she can inspect the wound. Stan is standing behind her, watching with a mixture of repulsion and concern. 

“Did I get him?” Eddie asks when Richie drops down onto the floor next to him. “I stabbed him in the fucking chest, he keeled over.”

“Yeah, he, uh, got away,” Richie says, wincing. “Shit, Eds, that looks really bad.”

“It went all the way through,” Eddie says. He laughs, high-pitched and hysterical. “Ohhh this is so bad. I still have puke all over me, this is gonna get _ fucking _infected and our shower is full of my blood.” 

“You can use mine,” Ben offers. He holds out a hand, and together he and Richie ease Eddie onto his feet. “You’re gonna be okay, Eddie.”

“Richie, can you get the first aid kit from my bag?” Eddie asks. Every word he speaks draws a wince from him, blood still trickling down his face. Richie wants to fucking cry. Instead, he nods, darting back into their room while Ben leads Eddie to his room. Richie collects the first aid kit and a change of clothes for Eddie. He also grabs Stan’s bird book. Ben, Bev, and Stan are all sitting outside in the hall, and he shoots them an awkward smile, dropping the book in Stan’s lap before he heads into Ben’s room and shuts the door. 

Eddie is standing pantsless in the bathroom, struggling to pull his polo over his head. Richie sets the clean clothes and the first aid kit on the bed and walks into the bathroom, gently helping Eddie ease out of his shirt. Eddie shivers. Richie rubs a soothing hand along his back, and then turns the shower on. 

He sits on the closed toilet seat while Eddie showers, letting steam fill the room. Neither of them say anything. Richie’s hands are shaking, and if he thinks too hard about what just happened he might start bawling. 

After, Eddie stands in front of Ben’s sink with a towel around his waist and the first aid kit open on the counter. He winces his way through cleaning the wound with disinfectant wipes, and then applies a couple butterfly bandages across his cheek.

“Eds,” Richie says, watching him from his seat on the toilet. “You need to go to a hospital, this is crazy.” Honestly, he can’t believe _ Eddie _isn’t insisting on going to a hospital, instead just tending to his own wounds with a hard set to his jaw, his lips pressed together and his eyes wide. 

Eddie looks over at him, pausing in tearing off a length of gauze. “Yeah, Rich, I fucking should. But Bowers is still out there, and he’s trying to take us out one by one, and Mike is fucking _ alone _in the library. We don’t have time to deal with this —” he gestures to his cheek — “right now.”

Richie blinks at him, stunned. Eddie turns away and finishes taping the gauze over his wound, heaving out a shaky breath. He takes a couple Tylenol, swallowing them dry even though he always yells at Richie for doing the same thing at home. 

“Okay,” Eddie says. “I just need to get dressed, and then we need to go get Mike.”

Richie stands up, closing the distance between them and pulling Eddie close, one arm wrapping around his shoulders while the other cradles the back of his head. Eddie relaxes into the embrace immediately, his arms circling Richie’s waist. Richie feels Eddie’s chest shudder as he inhales. 

“Jesus, Eddie, I’ve never been so scared in my fucking life,” Richie murmurs, pressing his lips to Eddie’s hair, still shower-damp. 

“Don’t say that,” Eddie says. “We’ve still got a whole fucking night of terror ahead of us.” 

“Thanks for the reminder,” Richie says. Eddie laughs, and then makes a quiet, pained sound and leans away. He looks up at Richie, lifting a hand to cup Richie’s jaw. “I’m sorry about before,” Richie says.

Eddie smiles slightly at him. “It’s okay.” Then he sighs. “We gotta go.” Richie nods, and reluctantly lets Eddie go so he can get dressed. 

They run into Bill on their way down the stairs. He takes in their expressions, and his eyes widen when he sees the bandage on Eddie’s cheek, which already has a tiny spot of red where the blood has started to seep through. 

“What the f-f-ffff— _ hell _happened?” he says, falling into step beside them. “Where are we going?”

“The library,” Ben says. “Hope you found your token.”

“Bowers was here,” Eddie adds. 

_ “What?” _

Bowers’ car is outside the library when they arrive, and Richie doesn’t think — he just fucking books it, up the steps and through the double doors. There’s clear signs of a struggle, a display case of Native American artifacts shattered and strewn across the ground, and he rounds the corner to see Bowers kneeling on top of Mike, spitting nonsense and trying to drive his switchblade into Mike’s throat. 

There is a handaxe, on the floor, and Richie still isn’t thinking about much except the blood pouring out of Eddie’s mouth and Bowers spitting slurs at him in the arcade and Mike making choked noises of panic in front of him — Richie heaves the axe over his head and brings it down on Henry Bowers’ fucking skull. Bowers chokes, his head tips forward, and he falls off of Mike and onto the floor, dead. 

“Well, I guess you could say that was overdue,” Richie says, as Mike stares up at him. “Get it, because we’re in a — mm, _ nope!” _ And Richie hunches over and pukes about a foot away from Bowers’ corpse. Fucking _ gross. _

The others have made it into the library by now, and Beverly yelps when she sees the dead body. Eddie is already hurrying over to Mike — he’s packed what he called the “bare essentials” of his much bigger first aid kit into a fanny pack. He bends down, taking Mike’s arm, which is bleeding steadily from Bowers’ knife. 

“He got me pretty good,” Mike says, pushing himself up into a sitting position and groaning.

“Yeah, you and me both,” Eddie says, smiling wryly. He looks over his shoulder at Richie, who is still hunched over with his hands on his knees. “You good, Rich?”

“You mean aside from the fact that I just fucking killed a guy? Yeah, I’m peachy!” 

“You kinda stole my thunder,” Eddie says, as he methodically wraps Mike’s forearm with gauze. “I thought _ I _killed him.”

“You two are _ literally _unbelievable,” Stan says, shaking his head. “Mike, what do we have to do now? Is it time?”

Mike gets to his feet, murmuring his thanks to Eddie, who is shoving everything back in the fanny pack. “It’s time,” he says, nodding. “You know where we need to go next.”

“Neibolt,” Bill says. “Fuck.”

Richie wipes his mouth, swallowing against the renewed surge of bile in his throat. “You said it, Big Bill.” Eddie comes over to stand beside him, and Richie straightens up, leaning into the touch when Eddie puts a hand on his back. “Alright. Let’s do this fucking thing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter's where the real fun begins! see y'all there. please leave a comment if you want, i love hearing what parts people enjoyed! and hmu on twitter @hermanngottiieb to talk reddie in the meantime. 
> 
> ALSO, just wanted to add a quick reminder to everyone to read the fic tags!!! this is an eddie lives and stan lives fic, i promise. <3
> 
> see ya soon!


	5. PART FIVE: Derry (Neibolt)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'll be real with you all, i wrote this entire chapter in a single day like a man possessed. i don't know how i did it. but i've been excited for the events of this one since before i started writing this fic, so i REALLY hope you'll all enjoy! 
> 
> CONTENT WARNINGS: descriptions of injuries/blood/violence

_ I'm not going anywhere _

_ Who do I think I'm kidding? _

_ I'm still standing in the same place _

_ Where you left me standing _

_ – The National, “I Am Easy to Find”  _

**October 2016**

Richie had expected — or maybe hoped — that the Neibolt house would feel smaller, less imposing, now that he’s an adult. But as he and the rest of the Losers stand on the sidewalk before it now, it looms over them as if it’s grown to accommodate their size, or maybe they’ve all shrunk down again. It’s dusk, and the windows of the house look like dark, gaping maws, ready to swallow them all whole. 

“All right,” Bill says, once they’ve all stood there staring at the house for a good minute or two, clutching their flashlights and saying nothing. “N-no use putting it off any longer.” He steps forward, off the sidewalk and onto the dead lawn.

“Wait,” Mike says. “Before we go inside, I just want to say something.” They all turn to look at him. “I know coming back to Derry hasn’t been easy, for any of you. If there was a way to do this without bringing you all back, I would have done it. But I… I’m so grateful that you came. You’re my family, and I love you all.” 

It really hits Richie then, the full weight of what Mike’s sacrificed for all of them. Decades of his life spent holed away in Derry, the sole bearer of the memories the rest of them forgot. Mike remembered everything about his friends who had left, and he’d had to stay behind and wait, no matter how lonely it got. Richie swallows the lump in his throat and claps a hand on Mike’s shoulder. Mike looks at him with a grateful smile, his eyes shining in the dim light. Bev hooks an arm around Mike’s waist to hug his side, and then Ben and Eddie and Stan and Bill all come over too, huddling together with Mike in the center.

“We love you too, Mike,” Ben says. “When all this is over, we’re getting you the hell out of this town. You’ve been stuck here long enough.” 

Mike laughs, wiping at his eyes. “Amen to that.” 

They stay that way a moment longer, and then a gust of wind sends them all shivering. When Richie glances over at the house again, he sees the door creak open, taunting them to enter.

Bill’s seen it, too. “Let’s go,” he says. Everyone steps out of the collective embrace, and they move together up toward the house. Bev bends down to grab a rusted fencepost from the dirt, clutching it in her hand like a spear. The stairs to the house groan under their collective weight, and Bill takes the lead, pushing the door open all the way with his foot. 

Everyone clicks on their flashlights as they step over the threshold. They stand there, quiet, waiting. The house is absolutely silent, layers of dust and cobwebs over everything. 

Eddie turns to look at Richie, his headlamp shining in Richie’s face so he has to squint. “Maybe IT doesn’t know we’re here yet,” Eddie says hopefully.

There’s a gurgling sound, like old plumbing clunking back to life, and then the same acidic black sludge they’d seen pouring out of the fortune cookies starts to ooze down the stairs, hissing and popping against the wood as it goes.

“I think IT knows,” Richie deadpans. 

“Fuck,” Eddie mutters. 

“Anyone remember the way to the basement?” Ben asks, sweeping his flashlight in a wide arc around the room. It illuminates  _ Good Cheer, Good Friends  _ engraved on the fireplace. With every step they take further into the house, Richie feels like his skin is crawling. A cold feeling settles in the pit of his stomach, and every instinct within him is screaming to turn around, get the fuck out of this hellhole before it consumes him completely. He clutches his flashlight tighter and follows Bill’s lead instead. 

“I think it’s th-through here,” Bill says, nodding to a door to his right. He pushes it open to reveal an empty room, but there’s a doorway at the other end. Bill jogs over to it, Mike and Ben following close behind. Richie goes more slowly, and he peers over Bill’s shoulder as they look through to where the doorway leads.

“There, I see stairs leading down,” Mike says, pointing. “This is it.” They all turn, to where Bev, Eddie, and Stan are still waiting outside the other doorway. “Guys, it’s right —”

The room suddenly seems to stretch like taffy, and the doorway where the rest of their friends stand is now very far away. Richie only gets a momentary glimpse of Eddie’s alarmed face, eyes widening in fear, before the door slams shut. 

“Oh  _ fuck!”  _ Richie yells. He runs back across the room and grabs the knob, but it won’t budge. “Eddie!  _ Eddie!”  _ He bangs on the door, and hears muffled banging from the other side. “Eds! Are you okay?”

“The fucking door’s stuck!” he hears Eddie say, and he sags against the door in relief just to hear him. “We can’t — it won’t open!”

“We’re fine, by the way,” Stan says, somehow managing to sound both terrified and sardonic at the same time. “Thanks for asking, Rich.”

“Go fuck yourself, Stanley,” Richie says, laughing. He presses his forehead against the door.

Bill, Mike, and Ben are all standing by Richie now, and Ben presses his palm to the wood. “Beverly, are you alright?”

“I’m fine,” Beverly says. “Are  _ you  _ guys okay?”

“Yeah, it’s just an empty room,” Ben says. “Maybe we can break the door down.”

As soon as he says it, there’s a hissing sound, and Richie jerks back from the door. The black ooze is back, seeping through the cracks around the doorframe, sliding down and eating away at the floorboards. The four of them scramble back, yelping in shock. 

“What’s going on?” Eddie yells from behind the door. “Rich? Ben? Someone fucking say something!”

“The fucking — acid slime!” Richie says, watching with horror as it continues to eat away at the floor in front of the door, creeping closer and closer to them and leaving behind a cavernous hole in its wake. It doesn’t make sense, that there should be so much empty space beneath the floor, but it looks like at least a four-story drop. The acid forces them further and further back, toward the doorway leading to the basement stairs. 

Richie looks at Bill, who stares at him with blatant panic. Richie knows they’re both remembering the way this slime had chased them back to the three “scary” doors, when they’d been here as kids. Richie thinks about the fake Eddie in the mattress, black sludge pouring from his mouth. 

“We’re going to break down the door!” Beverly yells. It’s hard to hear her now that they’re so far away. “Just hang on!” There’s a series of bangs, the door shuddering in its frame with each one. On the fifth bang, it swings open, and Beverly stands on the other side with one leg extended in a kick, Stan gripping her arm so she doesn’t topple forward into the hole in the floor. 

“Holy  _ shit,”  _ Stan says when he sees the widening gap between their doorway and the place where Richie, Mike, Bill, and Ben are standing. 

“You’re going to have to jump!” Mike calls to them. Beverly steps back, and Stan stares down into the abyss for a moment before he exhales and lunges across the gap. He lands hard on the opposite side, stumbling into Bill and Mike as he does so. Bill grabs him by the shoulders to steady him. 

Now that Stan’s out of the way, Richie can see Eddie, his eyes huge and horrified, standing a couple feet behind Beverly and covering his mouth with both hands. Bev shifts from foot to foot, and then hoists up the fencepost. 

“Here, catch!” she yells, and throws it across the gap. Ben scrambles and manages to catch it. Beverly tucks her hair behind her ear, backs up a few steps, and then runs and leaps forward. She lands in a crouch on the floor, huffing out her breath. Ben pulls her to her feet and hands her back the fencepost.

“Nice form,” he says. 

She laughs slightly. “Thanks.”

The chasm is still growing, only a few feet of floorboard before they hit the doorway to the basement. Eddie is standing on the opposite side, alone now, and Richie can see that he’s shaking. The gap is at least eight feet across. 

“Eds, come on!” he yells. Eddie looks up at him, his mouth working as he tries to speak. “Eddie, you have to jump!”

“I — I don’t — I can’t —”

“I  _ will _ catch you,” Richie says, holding out his hands. He has to keep shuffling back so the acid doesn’t eat his shoes. “Eddie, I  _ promise,  _ I’ll catch you.” 

He can’t hear it, but he sees Eddie’s mouth move around a muttered  _ “Motherfucker,”  _ and then he takes a running jump across the gap. Richie feels like time slows to a crawl, seconds stretching out like the room had before, and he watches Eddie’s arms pinwheel before he falls heavily into Richie’s waiting embrace, nearly sending them both to the floor. 

Richie staggers, moving away from the gap’s edge with Eddie hugged tight against his chest. “I got you,” he breathes, pressing his face into Eddie’s hair. “Hey, I got you, spaghetti man.” 

“Let’s get out of here,” Mike says, tugging on Richie’s shoulder, and they all turn and high-tail it through the door leading to the basement stairs. The slime finishes burning up the floor, coming to a stop right at the opposite doorway. 

“How the fuck are we going to get back out of here now?” Stan says, panting.

“We’ll cross that bridge when we get to it,” Mike says darkly. They’re all standing at the top of the basement staircase now, and it sends a shiver of intense deja vu through all of them.

Eddie is still tucked against Richie’s chest, and Richie leans back so he can look down at him. “You okay?”

Eddie nods. His face is ghostly pale, the headlamp making the hollows of his eyes seem darker and more sunken than they really are. His mouth wobbles for a second before he takes a deep breath through his nose and presses his lips together in a thin line. “I’m okay,” he croaks. 

Richie presses a hard kiss to Eddie’s temple, and then shifts so they’re standing side-by-side instead. “We’re sticking together from now on,” he says, grabbing Eddie’s hand. 

The Losers make their way down the basement stairs, and the well is there, the same as it was 27 years ago. The descent on the rope and the trudge through the sewers — it’s all so familiar, like a waking dream. Like it’s only been moments since they were last here, wading through greywater in the dark. 

“Ugh,” Eddie mutters, as they hop down out of a tunnel into water that’s now waist-deep. “This place is so fucking disgusting.”

“Careful, Eds, don’t let him hear you insulting his home decor,” Richie says, offering his hand to Bev so she can clamber out of the tunnel.

“Beep-beep, Richie, c-come on,” Bill says, swatting his shoulder. 

They round a corner and the tunnel opens up to a wide entryway, into the cistern. It’s flooded with water now, only the top of Pennywise’s caravan visible. They all look at each other.

“Well, it’s a nice night for a swim,” Beverly says, and she wades in, lifting her arms to hold the fencepost out of the water. Ben and Bill go quickly after, and Richie sighs before following suit. It’s a short distance to cross, and it’s still more wading than actually swimming, but it’s cold and slimy and Richie is more than happy to hoist himself out of the water and onto the soggy wooden top of the caravan.

There’s a round porthole door in the center of the roof, and Mike bends down to grasp the handle.

“What’s down there?” Ben asks.

“No one knows,” Mike says.

“Uhhh, don’t  _ love  _ that answer,” Richie says. Mike pulls the door open and Richie and steps back, throwing an arm out instinctively to shield Eddie, but nothing happens. It’s just an opening to a stone tunnel leading straight down.

“Well that doesn’t look ominous at all,” Stan says, peering down and grimacing. “Who wants to go first?”

Mike is already sitting down and hoisting himself into the opening. “I’ll see you all down there. Stick together!” 

“Oh,  _ now  _ he wants us to stick together,” Richie mutters. Beverly smacks his arm. People seem to be doing that a lot lately, he muses. 

Mike’s barely started to lower himself down when Eddie suddenly blurts out, “I don’t think I can do this.”

Everyone turns to look at him. Richie puts his hand on Eddie shoulder and shakes him gently. “Eds, come on, yes you can.”

Eddie shakes his head frantically. “No, no, I almost — back upstairs, I fucking froze up, Bev and Stan were  _ fine _ and I just — I thought I was gonna die up there, I couldn’t move, what if I do that again?” He closes his eyes, his chest heaving as he starts to hyperventilate. “I’m not brave like I used to be, Rich.”

Richie’s heart fucking breaks, and he grabs Eddie by both shoulders now, so they’re facing each other, and ducks his head so Eddie has to make eye contact. “Hey, no, that’s not even a  _ little  _ bit true. You had a moment, so what? It’s fucking scary, dude! I had a moment earlier today and it wasn’t even because of the killer clown, it was because of a fucking homophobic middle schooler from three decades ago!” He rattles Eddie slightly again, and Eddie huffs out a breath. “You know what you did today? You fought off Pennywise in the fucking pharmacy and strolled right back out, you  _ stabbed Bowers with a knife you pulled out of your own face,  _ have I mentioned how fucking  _ insane  _ that is? You bandaged up your own stab wound! Eds, you’re the bravest fucking person I know, and you’ve made  _ me  _ feel brave enough to do, like, every brave thing I’ve ever done. So you’re gonna come down into this scary tunnel, and we’re gonna kick some alien ass, okay? I can’t do it without you.” 

Eddie stares at him, his eyes shiny, and says in a wobbly voice, “Wow, Richie. You’re like, incredibly gay for me.”

Richie laughs, sharp and delighted, his chest burning with too many feelings to pin down. “Fuck  _ yeah  _ I am, you little jerk. Now are you good?”

Eddie sighs. He nods. “I’m good.”

“Good.” Richie turns around to see that the rest of the Losers are staring at the two of them. Bev, Ben, and Mike all have fond looks on their faces. Bill looks a bit bemused, and Stan just shakes his head, smiling slightly. “Anyone else need a Trashmouth pep talk? Stan? Bill?” Richie asks. He releases Eddie’s shoulders and claps his hands together. “Alright then. Ándale, amigos, let’s go!” 

Before she heads down, Bev hands the fencepost to Eddie, who frowns at her in confusion. “Here. I think you need a monster-killer more than I do right now,” she says. 

Eddie flushes and glances away, mumbling, “Thanks, Bev.” 

One by one, they climb down the tunnel. They have to squeeze through a tiny gap in the rock that Richie’s shoulders can barely fit through, and then the cavern opens up into a huge space, so high they can’t even see the ceiling. In the center, the spot where the meteor hit is a circle of jagged stone, shooting upward. 

“Ohhh shit,” Stan breathes. “This is — this doesn’t make  _ sense.  _ How is it — it shouldn’t go up that high, we’re not  _ that  _ far underground.”

“We’re a little past the whole ‘making sense’ thing here, Stan,” Richie points out. 

Stan scowls at him, and then turns back to stare at the strange rock structure. He looks almost —  _ offended,  _ more than scared. 

“What now, Mikey?” Bill asks. 

Mike approaches the rock structure and climbs up onto it. “Here. This is where we’ll perform the ritual.” 

They stand in a circle, Mike’s strange leather container sitting in the middle. Richie realizes, as he looks at Bill on his right and Eddie on his left, that they’re standing in the same order as they had the day they’d made the blood oath. He feels a phantom pain in his palm and clenches his fist. 

Mike pours lighter fluid into the container and lights a match. Then they go around and, one by one, drop their tokens into the flame. Bill puts in the paper boat he made with Georgie, which Richie has  _ no  _ idea how he’s managed to recover; Ben puts in his yearbook page, and Bev drops in the postcard. Stan has to fold and bend the bird book awkwardly in order to fit it inside the container. Eddie tosses in his inhaler with a pensive look furrowing his brow. 

Richie pulls out Eddie’s letter last, taking in the smudgy blue ink reading  _ DO NOT READ UNTIL YOU GET TO NEW YORK.  _ He can remember, now, the day Eddie gave it to him.  _ He was fourteen, and sitting in his room on moving day. His mom and dad were packing up the van, and Eddie was standing in front of him, looking around at all the boxes and the walls devoid of Richie’s usual posters and polaroids. He’d been determinedly trying not to cry, but Richie could see the tears shining in his eyes, and he’d swallowed his fear for long enough to grab Eddie in a tight hug, pressing his face into his neck and letting Eddie cling right back. When they’d finally pulled apart, Eddie had handed Richie the letter and said thickly, “Don’t open it while I’m here, I’ll get embarrassed.”  _

Richie shakes himself out of the memory and leans forward to drop the letter into the fire. He watches as the edge of the paper starts to burn and curl, and says a mental goodbye to the scared kid in his empty bedroom, watching smoke rise up out of the container. 

A moment later, the whole cavern seems to rattle, and above them there’s the sound of grinding stone. Richie looks up, and light starts to fill the vaulted space above them, revealing rows upon rows of teeth, a great, gaping maw.

“What the  _ fuck is that!”  _ Eddie yells from beside him.

Frantically, Mike says, “Don’t look into the Deadlights! Everyone close your eyes and hold hands.” Richie slams his eyes shut and fumbles, grabbing Bill and Eddie’s hands. “Now we all have to say ‘turn light into dark,’” Mike continues. “Got that? Turn light into dark!”

“Turn light into dark!” Richie says, and they all begin chanting it, over and over. Wind whips around them like a tornado, so loud that Richie can barely hear Eddie and Bill on either side of him. A bright light suddenly shines, one he can see even through his eyelids, and he squeezes them shut tighter, until all at once the lights are gone. The wind stops. Everyone’s voices falter and go quiet.

“Did we do it?” Stan asks. Richie opens his eyes. Mike is kneeling in front of the container, shoving the lid down onto it, but something is stopping it from closing all the way. It grows with a rubbery squeaking sound, and Richie realizes what it is — a red balloon.

“Is this supposed to happen?” Eddie squeaks.

The balloon grows so big that Mike fall back on his ass, the lid tumbling from his hands, and then they all have to scramble away as it pushes them right out of the rock formation. They stagger back, and Richie fumbles to grab Eddie’s hand, watching as the balloon fills the entire formation before it pops. It’s so loud that Richie falls to the ground, his ears ringing. 

“Eddie?” he calls, barely able to hear his own voice. He sits up. “Eds?”

“I’m here!” Eddie calls, a few feet to his right. His headlamp’s been knocked off his forehead. He staggers upright, clutching the fencepost, and bends down to pull Richie to his feet. “What the fuck was that?”

They spot Bill, Stan, and Mike a couple yards away, Ben and Beverly already jogging over. “Mike, was that part of the ritual?” Bev asks.

Mike doesn’t reply. His face looks very grim, and Richie’s heart sinks. 

“Mike?” he says. “What’s happening, bud? Did it work?” 

The ground rumbles again, and the voice from Richie’s worst nightmares says, gravelly and cackling, “Did it  _ work,  _ Mikey? Oh Mikey, did it  _ work?”  _

They all turn around, and Richie hears Stan yelp wordlessly, because Pennywise is there, and he’s fucking  _ enormous.  _ He’s peering at all of them through the cracks in the rock formation, his big yellow eyes filled with a cruel glee. 

“After all these years you’re still just foolish little children,” Pennywise cackles. “Don’t you know you can’t believe everything you read? All that time in the library, all that time sitting in the dark, and  _ that  _ was the best you came up with?” He rises up, and below the torso his body is some kind of horrific spider-crab, like the most fucked-up centaur Richie’s ever seen in his life. “You brought them all back for me, Mikey,” Pennywise croons. “And you led them right. Into. My. Arms.” His voice drops with each word, turning into a growl, and Mike is just  _ staring  _ up at Pennywise in complete anguish, even as IT lifts one arm that morphs into a jagged, spiky claw. 

“We gotta move, Mikey!” Bill yells.

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry,” Mike is sobbing, and Bill lunges just in time to tackle Mike out of the path of Pennywise’s claw. 

“Go, go, go!” Ben says, grabbing Beverly’s hand, and they all scatter as Pennywise bellows with laughter that echoes, filling the whole cavern. The Deadlights fill the room with strobing white light.

Richie and Eddie skitter around a corner and throw themselves behind a rock wall, breathing hard. Richie lets his head fall back against the rough stone, panting.

“What the  _ fuck  _ are we gonna do?!” Eddie says, his voice cracking. Richie straightens, leaning out from behind the rock wall to see what’s happening in the cavern. Pennywise is several yards away, digging a clawed arm into one of the other tunnels offshooting from the main opening. 

“I don’t think he knows we’re here,” Richie says, just as IT’s head swivels to lock eyes with him. “Oh, fuck me.”

Pennywise comes barreling their way, and they both scream bloody murder and bolt down the tunnel. It winds and twists, and eventually they come to a broader opening with two paths leading in opposite directions.

“Which way?” Eddie asks, gasping for air.

“Uhhh,” Richie looks between the two paths. They appear to be identical. “Eeny-meenie-minie-mo?” He offers. Eddie gives him a deeply unimpressed look. “What? I don’t see you offering any suggestions!”

The ground beneath their feet shudders, tiny pebbles and dirt bouncing up and down. “What  _ now,”  _ Eddie moans, and then the floor opens up and they’re falling. 

It feels like they fall for an incredibly long time, and when Richie finally hits solid ground again, it’s face-first. He feels the crunch of cartilage as his nose meets the floor, and groans in pain. He rolls onto his back, clutching his face, and feels blood dripping out of his broken nose. His glasses have miraculously not smashed entirely, but one of the lenses has a crack spiderwebbing along the length of it. For a moment he just stares up at the ceiling — the  _ ceiling?  _ Where the fuck is he?

Richie sits up. He’s in a room in Neibolt, from the looks of the dusty walls and floorboards. The lighting is dim, and he’s still getting his bearings when he hears a soft cry to his left. Eddie is laying flat on his back, whimpering and clutching his arm to his chest — his right arm, which is at a wrong angle, a  _ familiar  _ wrong angle.

“Oh, shit, Eddie,” Richie scrambles over to him, hands hovering before settling on Eddie’s shoulder and ribs. “Fuck. Is it broken?” He winces — it’s a stupid question, Eddie’s arm is  _ very obviously  _ broken, in the exact same way it had been 27 years ago. 

“Oh god, oh fuck,” Eddie says through gasping sobs. His breath is starting to come out in a tight whistle, like his throat is closing up. “Richie —  _ shit.”  _

“Okay, you’re gonna be okay,” Richie says, already panicking. His broken nose throbs painfully, blood leaking down the back of his throat. “Here, lemme help you sit up.” He eases one arm under Eddie’s back and gets him upright, and it’s only when Eddie is leaning up against an old cabinet that Richie starts to feel like the room they’re in is familiar. He turns around and sees a rusted fridge against the opposite wall.

“Well that’s not good,” he mutters. 

The fridge rattles. Eddie yelps. Richie grabs Eddie’s sleeve, crouched on the floor and watching in mute horror as the fridge door slams open, revealing a twisted-up knot of a body stuffed inside. It starts to unravel, folding out of the fridge and onto the floor, and Richie yells “Hey!” nonsensically in utter confusion and fear — it’s the fucking clown, torso spinning like a corkscrew until Pennywise is standing before them. He’s tall, towering over them both, and Richie can’t tell if it’s just because he and Eddie are both on the ground or if the clown is looming larger than life. Pennywise takes a slow, teasing step forward.

Eddie is sobbing, his feet scrabbling against the floor as he tries to push himself further away and his back meets the cabinet. “No, no no no,” he whimpers. 

“Eddie, don’t look at him, just look at me,” Richie says, tearing his gaze away from the clown and taking Eddie’s face in his hands, careful even now to avoid touching his wounded cheek. It’s all too  _ fucking  _ familiar, and Richie can’t believe he has to relive this moment, one of the worst and most terrifying moments of his life. Eddie’s eyes keep flickering to meet his and then away, back to Pennywise and his slow approach.

“Do you want to know why the ritual  _ really  _ didn’t work, Richie?” Pennywise says, and Richie looks at him, keeping his hands on Eddie’s cheeks. Pennywise is only a few feet away, bending slightly at the waist to look down at the two of them, a condescending smile on his face. “Ohhh, I think you’ve already guessed, haven’t you?”

Eddie’s breath rattles from his chest, and Richie can feel his tears where they gather against Richie’s fingers. Richie feels like he’s shrinking, growing smaller and more like a child the closer Pennywise gets. 

“It didn’t work because  _ you didn’t play by the rules,”  _ Pennywise says, sneering. “You thought you could cheat our game? Well cheaters get  _ punished,  _ Richie. You broke the rules, and now all your friends will die.” He smiles widely, his teeth razor sharp. “Was it worth it? Were those fourteen years of stolen time worth this?” 

Richie’s eyes burn, and he turns back to Eddie, clutching his face desperately. “It was,” he tells him in a choked voice. “Eds, look at me, it  _ was,  _ I wouldn’t take back any of it, not one single fucking day, do you hear me? I love you so much.” If he has to die now, in this disgusting house and this fucking town that took everything from him, he’s going to make sure Eddie understands that, at least — that just one day with Eddie would have been worth everything.

Eddie closes his eyes tightly, tears leaking out of the corners, and he wheezes, “I love you, I love you too, oh  _ god.”  _

“Time to float,” Pennywise growls; his hands grow clawed and beastly, and he lifts his arm up to deliver a killing blow — and a fencepost rams through his head, piercing right through his skull and coming out the other side. Richie lets out all his breath like its been punched out of him, stunned. He tears his gaze away from the gruesome visual of Pennywise’s fucked up face to see none other than Stan, clutching the end of the fencepost and driving it through Pennywise’s head. 

In an instant, Pennywise turns to ash and crumbles, and the room around them dissolves, and then they’re back in the tunnel beneath the sewers. Richie’s flashlight is on the ground some feet from him, casting a dull glow over the scene, and he and Eddie are pressed up against a stone wall. Stan is still holding the fencepost over his head in a stabbing motion, and after a moment of confusion he lowers his arms, chest heaving. 

“We make our own rules, right?” he says to Richie, tossing the fencepost to the ground before dropping to his knees beside Richie and Eddie. “God, Rich, your face is all fucked up.”

“Thanks,” Richie says. He stares at the spot where Pennywise had been a moment before. “Did — did you just kill IT?”

From the mouth of the tunnel, leading back to the main cavern, the flashing lights and echoing cackles of a giant spider-clown-alien answer that question for him. Stan glances behind him before turning back to Richie and saying, “Apparently not.” He puts his hand on Eddie’s knee. “Hey, Eddie, can you stand?”

Eddie makes a choked noise and nods. He allows Richie and Stan to hoist him up to his feet, still cradling his broken arm. Richie shrugs out of his jacket and uses it to create a makeshift sling, keeping Eddie’s arm tucked securely against his body. Eddie winces and whimpers through gritted teeth, and then he rests his forehead against Richie’s shoulder, breathing hard. 

“That,” he says after a few seconds, “was  _ fucked.”  _

Richie takes a good look at Stan for the first time since he rescued them, and sees that the old scars circling his face have been reopened, blood smearing along his forehead and jaw. “What the hell happened to you?” Richie asks.

Stan smiles grimly. “Something also fucked,” he says. He picks up the fencepost and hands it over to Eddie, who clutches it in his good hand. “We should find the others. We need to figure out a new fucking plan. I’m not dying in this sewer.”

“That’s the spirit, Stan the Man,” Richie says, punching his shoulder lightly. He puts his arm around Eddie, and the three of them start heading back up the tunnel, following the sound of Pennywise’s laughter. They’re about halfway when the laughter is cut through with a cry of fear — it’s Mike. Richie reacts on instinct, dropping his arm from Eddie’s shoulders and running ahead down the tunnel. 

“Richie!” Stan calls from behind him. “Slow down, you asshole!”

But Richie can’t slow down, because Mike spent 27 years in this hell and Richie couldn’t find him soon enough but he’s sure as shit not about to let him get gutted by the motherfucking clown, not after all that. He skids to a stop at the mouth of the tunnel, taking in the scene: Pennywise, large and spider-like, has morphed one of his arms into a tentacle, and it’s wrapped around Mike’s torso, lifting him into the air. Richie grabs a rock from the ground — a tried and true weapon against bullies in Derry — and pitches it at Pennywise’s big, stupid head. 

The clown jerks, startled, and whips around to glare at Richie, tossing Mike aside like a ragdoll. 

“Hey fuckface!” Richie yells, bending to scoop up another rock. “Yeah, I’m talking to you, you sack of shit! How’s this for cheating, motherf—”

Pennywise’s face opens up, and Richie’s eyes lock onto the giant glowing orbs of the Deadlights, and everything goes white. He is no longer aware of his body. There is nothing but the Deadlights, hot and white and encasing him entirely. He can hear the cacophonous clatter of them knocking together, beating against his brain like a new pulse. There is nothing,  _ he  _ is nothing, he’s being swallowed up, burning —

Richie falls to the cavern floor, hard. He has no idea what’s happening, except that there are spots like flashbulbs in front of his eyes when he blinks, and he stares dazedly upwards at nothing, vaguely aware of a monstrous choking,  _ dying  _ sound some distance away from him. As if from underwater, he hears someone calling his name.

Eddie’s face appears above him, a giddy, incredulous smile on his face. He’s on his knees, practically straddling Richie, his right arm still bound against his chest and his left clutching Richie’s shoulder. “Rich! Hey, there you go, you’re okay!” He leans down and kisses Richie’s stunned mouth, gently so he avoids bumping Richie’s nose. “I think — Richie, I think I killed IT! For real this time!”

Eddie is beaming down at him, and Richie sees it in his mind before it happens — the clown’s clawed arm, swinging down with a trajectory straight for Eddie’s exposed back — he hears Stan yell,  _ “Look out!”  _ and Richie flings his arms around Eddie and throws himself bodily sideways, taking Eddie along with him just as the claw slams into the ground next to them. 

Eddie screams in pain as his broken arm is crushed against the ground, and the sound cuts through Richie like a knife. Richie scrambles to his feet, pulling Eddie up with him. He spots Stan still at the mouth of the tunnel and makes a beeline for him, pulling Eddie along. Pennywise is laughing again, dragging the claw through the stone like he’s teasing them. 

Once they’re out of reach inside the tunnel, Eddie falls back against the wall, every breath coming out ragged and pained. “You fucker,” he manages, his eyes screwed shut. “Oh, I think you broke it worse, my fucking  _ arm,  _ oh shit.”

“I’m sorry,” Richie says. “Shit, Eds, I’m so sorry, I was just trying to get you out of the way, IT would’ve —”

“I  _ know,” _ Eddie cuts him off. He opens his eyes and lets out another harsh breath. “I know. It’s not actually your fault, this just hurts like a bitch.” 

There’s more yelling, and suddenly Bill, Mike, Ben, and Beverly are ducking into the tunnel, too. Bev is covered in what looks like blood, and Ben is filthy with dirt. Bill looks like he’s been dunked in water, his hair plastered to his forehead. 

“Hey gang,” Richie says, smiling weakly at them. “Looks like we’ve all been having a real fun time tonight.” 

“Eddie, are you okay?” Ben says, stepping forward with his hands outstretched, uncertain. “Did — did you break your arm? Again?”

“Sure fuckin’ did, thanks for asking,” Eddie says, grimacing.

“Jesus,” Ben says. 

“Mike,” Stan says, wiping a smear of blood from his cheek, “what the fuck do we do now? Did you have a Plan B?”

Mike shakes his head. “It took literal years of searching just to find that ritual. And it didn’t even work.” He presses the heels of his hands to his eyes for a moment before looking up again. “I’m so sorry, I never should have called you all back here, this was a huge mistake.”

“Mike, n-no,” Bill says, touching his arm. “Y-y-you did what you had to do. Sss-someone has to stop that thing.” 

“In the pharmacy,” Eddie says suddenly, his brow furrowing. “When the leper attacked me, I got my hands around its throat, I was choking it, and I — for a minute there, it really felt like I was  _ winning.  _ It was getting weaker. It felt so weak…” He trails off. 

“When Pennywise changes shape… IT has to exist in that shape, with its strengths  _ and _ weaknesses,” Mike says. His eyes widen. “If we can get him to change into something small, we could kill him.”

“We can go back through the tunnel at the entrance to the cavern,” Bev says. “He’ll have to make himself small enough to fit through!” 

“Well that sounds insane,” Stan says coolly. “Let’s do it, I guess.” 

They all squeeze through an offshoot of the tunnel they’re in, one that spits them back out into the main cavern, but closer to the entrance. Pennywise is still digging at the tunnel entrance they’d come from, unaware of where they’re moving. 

Richie can see the crevice they’d all squeezed through, just a few yards away. It looks well within sprinting distance.  _ This just might fucking work,  _ he thinks wildly. 

“Now!” Bill hisses, and they all make a mad dash for the entrance. Pennywise is on them in an instant, skittering across the floor on those giant spider legs and dropping in front of the entrance, blocking their way.

“Not so fast, Losers!” IT cackles. 

“God  _ damn it!”  _ Bill shouts. “Mikey, what do we do now?!”

_ “Die  _ is what you do,” Pennywise snarls. 

“There’s more than one way to make someone small,” Mike mutters. “Make him believe that he is.”

_ “What?” _ Richie exclaims. 

_ “Small?” _ Pennywise says, sounding equally baffled. He laughs, towering over them. “I am not small. I am the Eater of Worlds!” 

“Not to us!” Mike says. “You’re just a clown!”

Pennywise’s face drops, a flash of confusion — of fear. 

Richie thinks,  _ No fucking  _ way  _ is it this simple.  _ But he joins in anyway, shouting, “You’re a dumb fucking clown!” 

They all start hurling insults at IT, and to Richie’s absolute astonishment, it seems to be working. The less afraid they seem, the more Pennywise begins to fumble, aborted half-transformations shifting too rapidly to make a real impression, and IT is shrinking, slowly but surely, as they back it up into the rock formation where the ritual had failed. 

“You’re a coward,” Mike says, staring down at Pennywise’s now-pathetic body, pressed up into a corner with nowhere to go. 

“And we’re gonna f-fucking kill you,” Bill adds.

“We’re not afraid of you,” Stan says, even as his voice shakes. “Not anymore.” 

“Look at you,” Pennywise gurgles. “You’re all… grown up.”

Mike reaches forward and rips the clown’s heart right out of its chest. It’s black and pulsing in Mike’s hand. Bill places his hand over Mike’s and Bev does the same, and then all of them are holding Pennywise’s blackened heart before they crush it. It oozes between their fingers before turning to ash. When they look down at Pennywise, his golden eyes have gone dark and stony. Above them, the bang-flash of the Deadlights shutters and goes out. 

For a moment, there is only silence. Bill grabs Mike by the back of the neck and presses their foreheads together. Richie kisses the side of Eddie’s head, closing his eyes. 

Then the cavern starts to rumble, and Richie is  _ really  _ getting tired of this shit. Everything is beginning to fall apart, like it was only ever held together by the will of IT — which, come to think of it, it probably was. 

“We gotta get out of here,” Mike yells, and they all set off running back to the entrance. It’s a terrifying race against the clock, wedging themselves all back through the crevice and climbing back up the chute — Richie and Ben working together to boost Eddie up — and then splashing through the greywater again as it lurches around them. By the time they make it back up the basement stairs, the whole house is starting to collapse around them. Richie’s just starting to think they’re seriously fucked when Beverly points to a window, all jagged broken glass and rotted wood frame, and then Ben is kicking it open and they’re all tumbling out into the weeds outside, tripping over each other as they run off the lot and back onto the sidewalk. The moon is high in the sky, stars partially obscured by the clouds, and it’s by their muted light that the Losers watch the Neibolt house collapse in on itself and sink into the earth, leaving behind nothing but dirt and broken bottles and the weeds. 

No one in the neighboring houses comes outside to check what the cacophonous noise was. The street is quiet except for some crickets chirping, the mournful hoot of an owl. The seven of them stand on the sidewalk and stare at the lot. 

“We did it,” Ben says wonderingly, breaking the silence.

“We better have,” Stan says. “Because, no offense, I am  _ not  _ doing this with you lunatics again.”

“Think of it this way, Stan,” Richie says. “We’ve set the bar  _ super  _ low for future Losers Club reunions. All we have to do is  _ not  _ fight a space alien and we’re already surpassing our standards.” 

Bev starts giggling uncontrollably. Her laughter is contagious, and before they know it they’re all laughing and leaning into each other. Richie feels light as air, his arm around Eddie and his face pressed against Ben’s shoulder, and he almost forgets that his nose is busted until Beverly, calming down, says, “Jesus, Richie, your nose!” 

“Oh, shit, right.” He gingerly touches it and hisses in pain. “Yeah, that’s super broken.”

“I could’ve told you that, your face is covered in blood,” Bev says. “We should go to the hospital.”

“Yes  _ please,” _ Eddie says. They all start walking back to where they’d parked Mike and Ben’s cars a little ways down the street, and Richie reaches down to grab Eddie’s good hand. He squeezes it twice, and Eddie squeezes back, a quick pulse, like a heartbeat. 

“Thanks for saving my ass back there, Kaspbrak,” Richie says. “I was about to get toasted by those lights.” 

“I threw the fencepost into its mouth like a javelin,” Eddie says. “From like, thirty feet away,  _ with  _ my left hand. It was fucking awesome, I’m so mad you didn’t see it.” 

Richie grins. “You’re a goddamn superstar, Eds. I told you so.”

“Yeah, well, it had  _ you,”  _ Eddie mutters. He leans against Richie’s shoulder. “I couldn’t — I  _ had _ to do it, you know?” 

“Wow, it’s almost like you’re in love with me or something,” Richie says.

“Or something,” Eddie agrees. He pauses. They’re at the cars now, and the others are bickering about who should ride where. Eddie tilts his head up to look at Richie. “Did you really mean what you said? You wouldn’t trade any of it, even if it had meant we’d fucked up the ritual?”

“Eds,” Richie says earnestly, clutching his hand. “I’ve never meant anything more in my fucking life. I  _ love _ you. Finding you again is the best thing I’ve ever done. I wouldn’t change that for anything. I know that’s insanely selfish of me, but it’s true.” 

“I love you too,” Eddie says, his eyes welling up. He sniffles. “I’m crying because my arm hurts so fucking bad, but also because I love you so much, you big dumb idiot.” 

Richie laughs, and kisses Eddie’s forehead.

“Hey, dipshits! Get in the fucking car!” Stan yells at them from the passenger seat of Ben’s jeep. 

“Way to ruin the moment, Stanley!” Richie yells back at him. Stan leans over to beep the horn, and Ben swats him away, hissing something about waking up the whole neighborhood. 

Eddie and Richie exchange glances. “Come along, Eddie my love,” Richie says. “Our chariot awaits.” 

“God I hope they give me morphine,” Eddie says. Richie opens the door to the backseat and helps Eddie inside before sliding in beside him. Ben pulls the car out onto the street, Mike’s truck following behind. Richie glances back out the rear window for one last look at Neibolt, before they round the corner and it disappears from view. 

Richie sits in the hospital waiting room with the rest of the Losers, waiting for Eddie. There’s a splint on his nose, which is bulky and uncomfortable, and he can feel the deep purple bruises that have bloomed under his eyes and along the sides of his nose. He’s sure he looks like a complete wreck, but he can’t stop grinning. No one else can, either, so at least they look like a bunch of lunatics together. 

Eddie comes out into the waiting room and they all stand up and applaud him. The few other people in the room shoot them annoyed looks, but none so annoyed as the one Eddie is giving them. His arm is wrapped up in a fresh white cast, and there’s a neat row of stitches in his cheek. He looks exhausted and cranky, and Richie has never found him more beautiful. 

“You’re all assholes,” Eddie announces when he reaches them. Richie bends down to kiss his frowning mouth, and he relaxes. “Also I think I’m high. They gave me the  _ good  _ shit.”

“As they should,” Richie says. He runs a hand gently over Eddie’s cast. “Man, this sure takes me back. Just like old times, huh, Eds?” 

“Can we sign it?” Bill asks eagerly.

“If any of you write  _ loser  _ on it I’ll fucking eviscerate you,” Eddie warns. Richie and Bill exchange a glance that says they’d both been planning to do exactly that. Eddie scowls. “Never mind, none of you are allowed to touch my cast. Dickwads.”

“Aw, Eddie, it’ll be something to remember us by,” Beverly says. Her tone is teasing, but her words make all of them shift nervously, looking at each other. They’re all thinking, now, what Richie’s been trying  _ not  _ to think about since they climbed out of Neibolt — are they going to forget each other again as soon as they all leave? 

“We’re not going to forget this time,” Bill says firmly. 

“How do you know?” Stan asks.

“I j-just do,” Bill says. “I’ll set an alarm on my phone reminding me to t-t-text you every day if I have to. I’m nnnn-not letting any of you go a second time.” He gazes around at all of them, and the conviction in his voice is enough to make Richie believe him. Bill’s always had that effect on the Losers. 

“It’s over for good this time,” Mike says. “I think we’re going to be allowed to hold onto each other now.” 

“Good,” Ben says. He’s looking at Beverly, who looks up at him and smiles shyly.  _ Thank fuck for that,  _ Richie thinks fondly. They’re good for each other. In that moment, he loves both of them immensely. 

“I’m  _ starving,”  _ Eddie announces. “I haven’t eaten in like, a hundred hours. I could die.”

“It’s pretty early,” Mike says. “But I think the diner will be open by now. Anyone up for greasy breakfast food?”

“I could go to  _ town  _ on some hashbrowns right now,” Bev says. 

As they’re walking to the parking lot, Richie suddenly remembers something very important he has to do. He pulls out his phone and opens his message thread with Patty. 

> **RT: ** as you’ve heard, the evil has been defeated
> 
> **RT: ** and guess what?
> 
> **RT: ** it was totally fucking aliens.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> next chapter's the epilogue, which is already in the works so hopefully it'll be up before long! this is also the last chapter that'll start with a quote from the national's "i am easy to find" album, which i've listened to countless times while writing this fic. i highly recommend. 
> 
> leave a comment or come say hi on twitter @hermanngottiieb if you wanna! thank u all for reading, i'll see you in the last chapter! xoxo


	6. EPILOGUE

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> well, here we are. idk what to say except that i made myself cry while proofreading this chapter because i've grown so deeply fond of this fic and it's been such a fun time writing it and sharing it with you all! thanks for the kind comments and joining me on this wild ride, i truly was possessed for half the time writing all of this, i never expected to write an it fic this long. 
> 
> this chapter involves some music, i've linked the most important songs/playlist within the text, but you can also check out the full playlist [here](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3ieMYWYJqeMO9iVF1kQzOF?si=BGeKVur0SJCw_K4r_8RlYA). you'll know when it starts. 
> 
> no warnings this chapter except for excessive corny sentimental shit, because it's what they all deserve. :')

_ In this world we're just beginning _

_ To understand the miracle of living _

_ Baby, I was afraid before _

_ But I'm not afraid anymore _

_ – Belinda Carlisle, “Heaven Is a Place on Earth” _

** _December 2016_ **

It feels insane, at first, to go back home and return to the lives they’ve all been living, after everything — insane and maybe impossible. But in so many ways, the routine falls back into place easily, after Richie leaves Derry for the second time in his life. Mulaney graciously offers him another opening act slot, once his nose heals, and it goes _ much _better this time around, not least because Eddie gets to stand in the wings and watch him this time. Richie books a couple half hour solo shows at small venues for the new year. Now that he’s got full access to his memories, Richie thinks he can really mine his childhood trauma for some comedic gold. It’s what the pros do, after all, and no one else in the industry has trauma quite like Richie “Clown Killer” Tozier. 

(“You can’t call yourself ‘clown killer,’” Mike said during one of their early group Facetime calls. “No one else would get it, you’d just sound creepy.”

“Okay, fine, valid point, but maybe if _ you guys _called me that —”

“Absolutely not.”)

By the time two months have passed, the reminders in Richie’s life of what they faced have narrowed down to the raised line of a scar along Eddie’s cheek (that Richie finds every opportunity to kiss), the constant stream of texts from his best friends in their group message thread, and a new batch of nightmares inspired by the lingering imprint of the Deadlights in Richie’s subconscious. All in all, he’s calling it a win. 

Before he knows it, New Year’s Eve is two days away, and Richie is watching with a frankly embarrassing amount of fondness as Eddie paces around their apartment, muttering to himself as he peers into every room and straightens things up. 

“We have everything, right? You got everything for dinner?” he calls to Richie from the dining room.

“Yep, it’s all in the fridge. Which you know because you checked ten minutes ago.”

Eddie appears in the doorway and frowns at him. “And you got the air mattresses out of storage?”

Richie nudges one of them with his foot. “Right here. You gotta relax, Eddie. It’s not like the fucking queen of England is coming over. It’s our friends.”

“I _ know,” _Eddie huffs. He stops pacing and just stands there in the middle of the living room for a moment, and then his shoulders slump. “Sorry. It’s just the first time we’ve all been together since —” He pauses, rubbing absently at his right arm, only a week and a half out of the cast. Richie closes the distance between them so he can put his hands on Eddie’s shoulders. Eddie chews on the inside of his cheek, glancing off to the side before finally meeting Richie’s eyes. “It feels like a lot of pressure. For everything to go right.”

“It’ll all be fine,” Richie insists, squeezing Eddie’s shoulders before smoothing his hands up and down Eddie’s arms a couple times. “Hey. I promise.” 

“Yeah, okay,” Eddie says. He laughs slightly, leaning forward to rest his forehead against Richie’s chest. “Sorry, I’m being neurotic.”

“Eds, if I had an issue with your neuroses, we would _ not _have been cohabitating for the past decade and a half, believe me.” He laughs when Eddie punches him lightly in the ribs without lifting his head. Richie wraps his arms around Eddie and hugs him close, and Eddie shifts in his embrace until his head is resting against Richie’s shoulder. 

They stand like that for a minute or two, just holding each other, until a knock at the door makes them both jump. Richie grins, and he drops a kiss to the top of Eddie’s head before bounding to the door. When he opens it, he sees Stan, Patty, and Bill on the other side, wrapped up in coats and scarves and holding suitcases.

“Why if it isn’t the one true love of my life!” Richie exclaims delightedly. “Patricia Uris, you are a sight for sore eyes.”

“Gee, nice to see you too, Rich,” Bill deadpans.

Richie waves him off. “Can it, Denbrough, you’re not carrying precious cargo.” He hugs Patty gently and kisses her on the cheek.

“Rich, please, I’m not even showing yet,” Patty says, laughing. “Will you let us in?”

He steps aside, waving the three of them into the apartment. “Come in, come in, beautiful people.” Once they’re all over the threshold, Richie slings an arm around Bill and Stan, pulling them both into a hug at once. They both make obligatory noises of protest, but neither of them move away. They all hug each other a little tighter these days, a little longer than most people do. Making up for all the lost years.

“Quit hogging our friends,” Eddie says, coming around the corner and hugging Patty before giving Richie an annoyed look. The facade is broken almost immediately when Bill pulls him into a hug, and Richie can see the broad smile Eddie hides against Bill’s shoulder.

“Were your flights okay?” Eddie asks, as the five of them make their way to the living room. Stan, Patty, and Bill drop their luggage on the floor and sit down on the couch. 

“My flight to Atlanta was fine. Weather made things a little rocky just now when we were coming into the city,” Bill says, “but it looks like it’s cleared up.” 

“Just in case you were wondering, turbulence mixed with pregnancy is _ not _fun,” Patty says, resting her hands against her stomach.

“How _ is _ the little Stanlet doing?” Richie asks, sitting on the arm of the couch next to her.

_ “ _ Our _ future child _is doing fine,” Stan says, narrowing his eyes at Richie. “I’ll kill you if you keep calling them that, Richie, I swear I will.” 

“Well I’m sorry, Stan, but Patlet just doesn’t have the same ring to it,” Richie says seriously. Bill bursts out laughing, and Richie grins, triumphant. 

It’s been infinitely more fun to fuck with Stan now that he has the rest of his friends back. Not that Eddie doesn’t often join in on the ribbing, but Eddie also enjoys denying Richie the satisfaction of laughing at his jokes. Bill, on the other hand, laughs far too easily when Richie goes into a bit. He suspects it’s partly because Bill hasn’t had time to get sick of it the way Eddie and Stan have, but he’s going to take advantage of that while it lasts.

“It’s a perfectly respectable name,” Richie continues, really milking it now. “I mean, why go with Stan Jr. when you could be ahead of the curve with Stanlet?” 

Patty grins at him, a mischievous twinkle in her eye, before she puts a hand on Stan’s arm. “You know, honey, I’m starting to like it. I even call the baby Stanlet sometimes in my head.” 

“Ha!” Richie says, pointing at Patty.

Stan groans. “I never should’ve let you two become friends, I regret it every day. I think I need a drink.”

Richie laughs. “I got you covered, Stan the Man. We have that nasty seltzer shit that Eddie likes, and coffee, and for those _ not _with child, we do have adult beverages.”

_ “Ignoring _ the seltzer comment,” Eddie says pointedly. “We’ve got beer, wine, uhh what else did you get, Rich?”

Richie pauses. He remembers Eddie making a list of things for him to get at the liquor store the night before, remembers looking at it and thinking _ yep, definitely need to get this shit done so Eds doesn’t have a conniption, _and then he remembers — “I, uh, may have gotten none of the above,” he says, wincing.

Eddie blinks at him. “Rich, having everyone over was _ your _ idea, I ask you to do _ one _thing —”

“You asked me to do many things!” Richie exclaims. “Get the mattresses out of storage, get, fuckin’, _ kale _for dinner —”

“Oh my _ god _ just go get the alcohol,” Eddie cuts him off. “Christ. Now _ I _need a drink.”

Bill, Stan, and Patty are watching this exchange with matching amused expressions. “Just like old times,” Bill says, nudging Stan.

“You have _ no _idea,” Stan agrees. 

“Suck my left one, Stanley,” Richie says, pushing himself up off the arm of the couch. “Alright, nerds, I’ll be back with your precious booze. Sayonara.” 

“Put on your coat!” Eddie calls to his retreating back. “It’s like 35 degrees outside!” 

Richie grabs his leather jacket off the hook, figuring that the liquor store is only like two blocks away and he doesn’t need to bundle up for that short of a trip. Honestly, he’s a little relieved to have escaped the conversation, because the moment Eddie mentioned that having everyone come stay for New Year’s was Richie’s idea, Richie had seen Bill do this _ very _ unsubtle, knowing smirk, and the last thing he needs is Bill “can’t lie to save his ass” Denbrough giving away all of Richie’s grand romantic plans. Hopefully by the time he gets back with the booze, the others will have arrived and everyone will be suitably distracted from ruining the surprise. 

It’s pretty fucking cold, honestly, but Richie shoves his hands deep in his pockets and trudges across the snowy street, and makes it to the liquor store in a record ten minutes. He stamps his feet on the sidewalk before pushing the door open and hurrying inside. He has to go off memory for what Eddie had put on the list, but he just grabs their usual selections and figures it’ll be good enough. He’s got two six-packs balanced in his arms and is just looking around for a basket so he can pick up a couple bottles of the shitty rosé that Eddie likes when his phone starts ringing. He eases the beer onto one of the shelves next to him and pulls it out. Beverly’s contact photo fills the screen, and he smiles before answering.

“Bevvie baby, to what do I owe the pleasure?”

“Hi, Rich,” Bev says. There’s noise in the background, the tell-tale chatter of the rest of the Losers. “Ben and Mike and I just got to your house, Eddie said you were picking up drinks.”

“Correctamundo,” Richie says. “Lest I incur any more of his wrath, could you ask him if he wants anything besides beer and wine?”

“Sure, hang on.” Bev’s voice grows fainter for a second, and Richie can hear Eddie’s annoyed voice responding, and then Bev is back. “He says no. But if you’re taking requests…” 

“Say no more, Red, I know what you’re after,” Richie says. “We gonna do fireball shots?” 

Bev snickers. _ “Hell _no, that was a mistake we’re not making again. I’m still recovering from last month.” 

“Same. Not to sound like Eddie, but if we drink that crap again I’ll be shitting for a week,” Richie says. Across the aisle from him, a man perusing the hard ciders shoots Richie an affronted look. Richie smiles innocently at him. 

“I was _ going _to say, you might want to pick up champagne,” Beverly says pointedly. “You know, for the… special occasion.”

“And by that you mean New Year’s and _ nothing else, _ so help me god you’re all bad at keeping secrets,” Richie says, rolling his eyes. “Sure, I’ll get a bottle.” He’s about to say more, but then he hears Eddie’s voice on the other end of the line again, indecipherable but clearly yelling about something. “Everything good over there?”

“It just started snowing again,” Bev says. Richie glances out the large glass window of the liquor store and sees that it indeed has, thick white flakes already starting to coat the sidewalk outside. “And Eddie knows you didn’t wear your coat, so he’s saying you should stay there until it stops.” She pauses. “Why didn’t you wear a coat, dummy? It’s freezing outside.”

“Tell my sweet baby Eds not to worry his little head about it, it’s a short walk. Think of it this way, we won’t even have to chill the wine!” Richie tucks the phone between his ear and shoulder, scooping up his various bottles, and makes his way over to the counter. “I’ll see you in ten.”

“Godspeed,” Bev says seriously, and then hangs up. 

Richie pays for everything and then, clutching two paper bags full of his purchases, he steps outside. He immediately winces in regret — it’s fucking _ cold, _ the wind biting his face and hands, and the snow immediately makes his glasses spotty. But he’s already committed, so he tightens his grip on the bags, ducks his head, and starts the two-block trudge back to the apartment. 

By the time he’s stomping up the stairwell, his hands are bright red from cold, and he can’t feel his fingers anymore. He keeps glancing down to make sure he’s actually still holding the bags. Shivering uncontrollably, he reaches his and Eddie’s door, but his hands are too stiff to pull out his keys so he just kicks the door a couple times in a pathetic imitation of a knock.

Eddie flings it open almost immediately, and his expression shifts from one of irritation to the kind of intense concern that it seems only Richie can awaken in him. He grabs Richie by the arms and hauls him into the apartment with a grumbled, “Jesus _ Christ, _Rich.” He takes the bags from Richie and sets them on the table in the entryway, his brow furrowing when he basically has to pry Richie’s fingers off the handles.

“And hello to you t-t-too,” Richie says through his chattering teeth. 

Eddie’s brows remain knit with stress as he eases Richie out of his leather jacket and hangs it on the coat rack, and then steers him into the living room. Everyone’s sitting around on the couch or floor chatting. They all look up when Eddie and Richie enter the room.

“There he is!” Mike says, smiling at Richie. 

“Little cold out there, Rich?” Ben asks, raising an eyebrow.

Richie clumsily flips him off. Eddie is guiding him toward the couch, where he wedges him down at the end, next to Stan. 

“Stay right there, I’ll get you a blanket,” Eddie says. He hurries off, and Richie continues to shiver. 

“It’s like you’re _ trying _to give him a stress ulcer,” Stan says, shaking his head.

“Don’t say that too loudly, you’ll get Eddie started on the ulcer rant again,” Patty says from Stan’s other side.

“How have you lived in New York this long and you still don’t know how to dress yourself for winter?” Mike says.

Richie shrugs. “Hey, man, I don’t even know. I think when I got Deadlighted it killed some of my brain cells.” When everyone gives him varying looks of disapproval, he says, “What! It’s _ my _trauma, I’ll make jokes about it if I want —”

He’s cut off by Eddie returning and throwing a blanket on top of him. A moment later the blanket is pulled off his head and tucked more carefully around his shoulders. It’s one of the thick fleece ones Richie’s mom got them for Christmas, and he shudders gratefully at its warmth. Eddie is kneeling in front of him, and he takes Richie’s hands between both of his own, squeezing them to get some feeling back into Richie’s fingers.

“You’re such a dick,” Eddie mutters, his palm smoothing over Richie’s knuckles. “It’s like you do these things just to give me anxiety.”

“Well how else am I gonna get you to hold my hand, baby?” Richie teases. Eddie glares at him, but relents when Richie leans forward to kiss the pinched spot between his eyebrows. “’M sorry, Eds,” Richie adds, quieter.

“I’ll go get the drinks,” Bill offers, getting up from his spot on the floor next to Mike and heading into the entryway. 

For the next couple hours, things settle into a comfortable chaos, one that Richie has missed desperately. They eat dinner in the living room and then break out the booze — all except for Patty, who seems content enough to sip warm cider and watch everyone else act stupid. Eddie ends up in Richie’s lap, which Richie coerces him into doing to keep him warm, but he would’ve ended up there eventually anyway. Everyone’s tipsy and rowdy, sharing stories that they’ve all already heard from their group texts but want to hear again. 

He’s seen some of them since October — Beverly lives in New York, too, which means that now Ben does, and Stan and Patty ended up staying with Richie and Eddie for a week after Derry — but being all together again, with no looming spectre of evil to cloud the mood, is something they only got to have briefly, that early morning in the diner. It’s enough to make Richie feel all kinds of sentimental, but instead he just sticks the back of his icy hand on Stan’s neck to make him flinch, sneaks his fingers under Eddie’s shirt, and basks in the feeling of all the people he loves most in the world sitting around him. 

Eventually, they all agree to call it a night, because they’re too old to stay up into the wee hours of the morning like they could when they were kids having sleepovers. Mike and Bill help blow up the air mattresses, and they pull out the hideaway bed in the couch, and everyone starts getting ready for bed. 

Richie and Eddie get first dibs in the bathroom, and Richie dutifully washes his face with the cleanser Eddie bought for him and insists that he uses nowadays. He looks over at Eddie in the mirror — he’s brushing his teeth almost aggressively, glowering down at the sink. 

“Eds, I can practically hear you catastrophizing up in there,” Richie says, reaching over to tap the side of Eddie’s head with a finger. Eddie leans away from him. “C’mon, what’s wrong?”

Eddie spits toothpaste into the sink and continues to frown, not looking at him. Richie deflates slightly.

“Are you actually still mad about me not wearing a coat? I said I was sorry.” 

“I’m not _ mad _at you,” Eddie exclaims, finally looking at him, and Richie recognizes the look on his face as worry, not anger. “I wish you wouldn’t do shit like that, Rich, it really stresses me the fuck out.” 

“Eddie, I’m fine,” Richie says, stepping a little closer and taking one of Eddie’s hands. “No frostbite or anything. I can even feel all my fingers again,” he jokes.

Eddie doesn’t laugh. “You’re just — so — _ reckless _ sometimes,” he says, and Richie can tell he’s working himself up into one of his classic Eddie rants, the way his breath hitches slightly and catches on half the words, like he can’t get them out fast enough. “You make these stupid decisions and put your fucking, your _ life _at risk, Richie, and you don’t even think about the consequences!” He runs his free hand through his hair and exhales hard through his nose.

“…okay, are we still talking about the coat thing, or is this about something else?” Richie asks after a moment. He squeezes Eddie’s hand, like a reminder, and Eddie’s breath leaves him in a tired sigh.

“It’s maybe about more than the coat thing,” he admits begrudgingly. “Fuck, I’ve been trying to just unclench for once, and it’s great to have everyone back in the same place again, but I just keep — I close my eyes and I see you floating in the air with your eyes all fucking glazed over.” Eddie’s voice gets rougher when he says it, slightly choked, and Richie’s heart plummets. “And, and I think about, like, what if I’d fucking missed? I mean I wasn’t even throwing with my dominant arm, what if I’d thrown that stupid spear and _ missed _and —”

“Eds, Jesus, stop it,” Richie says, dropping Eddie’s hand so that he can grab him by the shoulders instead. He shakes him gently. “Don’t go into a ‘what if’ spiral, okay, you know that’s just asking for a panic attack. I’m fine. You didn’t miss. And what happened today was because I’m an idiot who forgot how to properly dress for winter, so don’t even think about using this to justify your paranoia that something bad’s gonna happen every time we’re all together again. The only clown here is me, got it?” 

Eddie laughs at that, just a little. “You _ are _ an idiot,” he agrees. “And a clown.”

“Oh honey, I _ know,” _Richie says, crowding in close to he can kiss Eddie, long and slow. Eddie sighs into it, his arms lifting to hook around Richie’s neck, and Richie slips his hands up under Eddie’s shirt to splay across the warm skin of his back. Eddie shivers at the touch.

“Richie,” he breathes when their mouths part.

“Hey,” Richie murmurs, letting his hands slide lower, toward Eddie’s waistband. “Do you think if we were quiet —”

“Richie!” Eddie says again, stern this time. “We are not having sex in the bathroom when all our friends are in the house, you freak. Keep your weirdo exhibitionist kink to yourself.”

Richie cackles. “You’re no fun.”

There’s a knock on the bathroom door, and Bev’s voice floats through. “Hey, are you guys almost done in there? I need to brush my teeth.” 

Eddie narrows his eyes at Richie and pulls him back in for one more kiss, quick but hard, and he tugs Richie’s bottom lip between his teeth before he pulls away. Richie yelps.

“Hey, no fair!” he says.

The corner of Eddie’s mouth twitches up into a smile, and he nudges Richie out of the way so he can open the bathroom door. “All yours,” he tells Beverly.

Bev eyes Richie’s disheveled appearance and kiss-bitten mouth. She raises her eyebrows. 

Richie wags a finger at her. “Not a word, Marsh. Not. A. Word.” 

The apartment really isn’t big enough for so many people to fit in it, but like their old childhood clubhouse, it seems to stretch to accommodate them. Stan and Patty take the hideaway bed, and Bill and Mike take one of the mattresses in the living room. They set up the other mattress on the floor of the bedroom for Bev and Ben. They leave the bedroom door open, so they can hear the quiet shuffling and murmuring of everyone getting ready for bed, and it fills Richie with nostalgia for sleepovers at Bill’s house back in the day — only with less pillow fights and Eddie throwing Monopoly pieces at Richie’s head. 

When he crawls into bed, he’s not surprised that Eddie shoves him until he rolls on his side so Eddie can spoon him. Richie clasps Eddie’s left hand in his own, and can’t help himself from bringing it to his lips, kissing Eddie’s ring finger. Hopefully Eddie’s tired enough that the gesture isn’t too obvious. To Richie’s relief, Eddie just sighs sleepily and nuzzles between Richie’s shoulder blades. 

“Good night, guys,” Ben whispers from the air mattress.

“Sweet dreams,” Richie whispers back. He closes his eyes and lets the steady rise and fall of Eddie’s chest against his back lull him into sleep. 

Richie wakes up some hours later with the details of a Deadlights nightmare already slipping away from him. It still leaves him shaky, the way they always do, and he blinks up at the ceiling in the dark for a few minutes while he waits for his heart to stop racing. In the night he’s shifted onto his back, Eddie curled up against his side with his face practically in Richie’s armpit. Richie smiles, watching him sleep peacefully. One of Eddie’s hands is pressed against Richie’s chest, over his heart. 

He doesn’t remember much of the dream, but he thinks it had something to do with Eddie, because they usually do — at least he didn’t wake up crying this time, that’d be embarrassing with everyone in the house. Still, Richie feels unsettled, so he does what he usually does after one of the nightmares, and eases himself out of Eddie’s sleeping embrace and creeps out of the room, edging around Ben and Bev’s air mattress. 

Normally, he’ll just go sit in the living room while he calms down, but the rest of his friends are sleeping in there, so his options are limited. He ends up stepping into his slippers and shrugging on his winter coat — he’s learned his lesson, okay — before slipping out the back door onto the balcony. He sits in one of the patio chairs, watching the grey light of early morning peek through the clouds. The city traffic is a soothing, familiar white noise. 

He’s not sure how long he’s been outside when he hears the door slide open and shut again, and he looks up to see Stan standing beside his chair, holding two mugs of coffee. 

“Morning,” Stan says, handing him a mug.

Richie takes it. “Coffee? Pour _ moi?” _He presses a hand to his heart.

Stan sighs, sitting in one of the other patio chairs. “Every time I’m nice to you, you make me regret it.” He sips his coffee and looks out at the skyline. “What are you doing out here?” 

“Nightmare,” Richie says simply. No use lying to Stan about it. “You?”

“Yeah,” Stan says. “You know, I was sort of expecting all of that to go away once we killed IT. I mean, they’re not _ premonitions _anymore, so I guess that’s an improvement.” He shakes his head. “Still, kind of rude that we had to go through all of that and still have to deal with this shit.”

“Trauma’s a bitch,” Richie agrees. “You, uh, wanna talk about your dream?”

“Sure don’t,” Stan says pleasantly. “And I’m guessing you don’t, either.”

“I barely remember it now,” Richie admits. “But still, no.” 

They sit in companionable silence for a while, and Richie’s mind finally starts to move on from the remnants of his dream to other things. Like the fact that it’s now Friday, and it’s _ The Day, _and suddenly his hands around the mug grow very sweaty. 

“Hey, Stan?” Richie asks. Stan glances over at him. “How… how did you _ know _ it was the right time to propose to Patty?”

Stan raises an eyebrow. “Am I allowed to ask why we’re talking about this?” 

Richie reaches over to gently shove his shoulder. “Fuck off, man, you know why.” 

Stan smiles. “Richie, it’s the right time. That’s literally why we’re all here. You guys have been waiting so long for this, you know he’s going to say yes.” 

“I _ know, _but what if he doesn’t like my whole —” Richie gestures vaguely — “plan and everything?” 

“He’s going to like it. It’s very… you.” Stan takes another sip of coffee. “Just relax, Rich. You’ve got this.”

Richie knows he’s right. He sighs, sagging back into his chair, and drains the rest of his mug. “Yeah, alright. Thanks, bud.”

“Any time,” Stan says mildly. He smirks over the rim of his mug when he thinks Richie’s not looking. 

It’s Mike’s first time in New York, so they have a busy day planned. They all bundle up and head into Manhattan so Mike can see Times Square and the handful of people in mascot costumes who’ve braved the cold. Tromping through the snow to look at all the touristy shit ends up being a lot more fun than Richie would’ve expected — he’s never actually done a lot of it, for all that he’s lived in New York for the majority of his life now. And everything is more fun with all of his friends; they’re a swarm of noise and laughter and touching, and they descend upon several restaurants and shops like a cheerful mob. Richie insists on buying Mike a shirt from a tourist shop that says NEW YORK FUCKING CITY in bold white letters across the chest. 

“Happy birthday,” Richie says, presenting it to him. 

Mike laughs, folding the shirt and tucking it under his arm. “My birthday’s in July.”

“This is making up for me missing it this year,” Richie insists. “And, like, every year for the past 27 years. I think you’ll agree it was worth the wait.”

“Oh, for sure,” Mike says, nodding. “I can’t wait to wear this everywhere I go.”

Richie grins and throws an arm around him, and Mike smiles back. “I’m so fucking glad you’re here, man,” Richie tells him.

Mike’s smile turns fond. “Me too, Rich. Me fucking too.” 

In the evening, they walk through Central Park. It’s a clear night, even though the stars are never really all that visible in the city, but the moon is bright and it’s nice anyway. They’ve all sort of paired off as they walk — Stan and Patty, Ben and Bev, Richie and Eddie; Mike and Bill are walking close together, Mike’s head bent as they speak in soft voices, and it makes Richie smile to himself. The whole day has been perfect, and they’re going to go back to the apartment soon and then things will get even better. He’s not as nervous as he was this morning, more jittery with excitement than anything else. 

While the others stop at a street vendor selling hot chocolate, Richie looks up at the sky and appreciates at the way the snow dusts the trees. He doesn’t think much of it when Eddie slips out from under his arm and ducks down to the ground, and when Eddie wraps his arms around Richie’s middle a moment later, Richie just blinks down at him in mild surprise.

“Well hello,” Richie says. Eddie smiles sweetly at him, and if Richie weren’t so idiotically lovestruck it would’ve been a warning sign. “To what do I —” He’s cut off when Eddie suddenly shoves both hands, clutching fistfuls of snow, down the back of Richie’s pants. Richie yelps, flailing backwards, while Eddie laughs so hard he’s practically bent double. 

“What the hell!” Richie exclaims, starting to laugh even as he dances from foot to foot and feels icy slush dripping down his legs. “Jeez, Eds, if you wanted to get me wet there are easier ways to —” Eddie throws a snowball at his face. “Okay, it is _ on, _little man!”

The ensuing snowball fight devolves quickly into a “throwing armfuls of loose snow” fight, because Richie is too impatient to actually make a snowball, and Eddie keeps being too ambitious and gathering more snow than he can reasonably crush together. Eventually Eddie just barrels into Richie, catching him by the waist and taking them both to the snowy ground. They’re both laughing so hard they can barely breathe. 

“You’re a maniac,” Richie says, wiping his eyes with a gloved hand and before reaching out to grip Eddie’s shoulders. Eddie is propped up above him, and the position only makes Richie’s stomach lurch with fearful memories for a moment before he shoves that aside. 

“You surrendering, Tozier?” Eddie teases. 

“Mm, I dunno,” Richie says, drumming his fingers on Eddie’s shoulders. Eddie smiles down at him, bright and open. His cheeks and nose are red from the cold, and his hair is slightly damp with snow, flopping over his forehead. He’s wearing earmuffs, for Christ’s sake — Richie’s a goner.

He must be staring in silence a little too long, because Eddie’s expression turns curious and he says, “What?”

“Nothing,” Richie says. “I just…” He pauses, moving to brush his gloved fingers over the scar on Eddie’s cheek. “You have no idea, Eds.”

“No idea about what?” 

“How much I fucking love you,” Richie says honestly.

Eddie’s eyes immediately go shiny, and he blinks rapidly a few times before grabbing the collar of Richie’s coat and reeling him in for a kiss. His mouth is a shock of warmth against the cold night air, and Richie sighs into it. When they break apart, Eddie murmurs, “I love you so much, you sentimental piece of shit.” 

“What are you two hooligans doing?” Bev’s voice says, and Richie turns to see the rest of their friends approaching, now all holding styrofoam cups of hot chocolate. 

“Eds has had a change of heart,” Richie announces. “He’s pro ‘Richie getting hypothermia’ now.” 

Eddie swats his arm. “You’re not going to get hypothermia, shut the fuck up.” He clambers off of Richie and helps him to his feet, taking a moment to dust snow off of Richie’s coat and lingering with his hands pressed to Richie’s chest. “Let’s go back home, I’m pretty sure I have snow in my underwear.”

“Heaven forbid,” Richie says, clutching both of Eddie’s hands against his chest. “I can’t _ imagine _what that’s like.” 

Back at the apartment, Richie and Eddie change out of their damp clothes and then everyone ends up back in the living room. Bill and Ben keep giving Richie looks that are _ far _too obvious, but finally the time is right and Richie jumps to his feet.

“Hey, so I have a surprise for everyone,” he says. He walks over to the radio sitting on an end table and clicks it on, spinning the dial to the right station. “I got a little something set up at work,” he says over his shoulder.

His co-host, Paul, is speaking when he finds the station. “— As you all know, Trashmouth Tozier is on vacation tonight, but he’s cooked up a little something special for all of you at home. Here’s an hour of commercial-free [’80s Nostalgia Night](https://open.spotify.com/playlist/3ieMYWYJqeMO9iVF1kQzOF?si=LozOI8FYRaSWIhEvMX7S3w), coming right up.” A moment later a familiar guitar chord strums, followed by the Beastie Boys yelling [“Kick it!”](https://open.spotify.com/track/5NLuC70kZQv8q34QyQa1DP?si=r7wqZ7zHQaC-77t_uCF4eg)

Bill, Eddie, and Stan all make whoops of approval, and Richie turns around to face them, grinning. He knows what they’re all thinking of — being ten years old, sticking the _ Licensed to Ill _ tape into Richie’s cassette player, and the four of them dancing around sock-footed in Richie’s bedroom, jumping up and down and screaming the words to “Fight For Your Right” in each other’s faces. They’d air guitar and headbang, bouncing on Richie’s bed and laughing their way through yelling the “porno mag” lyric. Richie can still _ vividly _remember the day his mother came home early and, duly horrified by the vulgarity of the songs, banned the tape from the house. 

It doesn’t take long for all of the Losers and Patty to start singing and dancing along now, and when the song shifts right into “Rock Lobster,” Eddie cracks up. Another song they’d all spent many an afternoon singing along to, especially Eddie and Richie, _ especially _in the old clubhouse until it drove everyone up the wall. Richie hopes that his song choices aren’t obvious enough to tip Eddie off — they’re all songs that relate to their shared childhood with all the Losers, sure, but all of them have particular memories attached to Eddie, for Richie. They’ve got nearly an hour of songs to go, and Richie just doesn’t want to give it all away too soon. This is a carefully fucking curated playlist. 

The songs shift to the more romantic side about halfway through — Bev and Patty join Richie in dramatically serenading the group with “Take My Breath Away” — and when “Time After Time” comes on, they’ve all worn themselves out enough to be sitting around just enjoying the music. Eddie is cuddled up against Richie’s side, and Richie would love to stay there for the rest of the night or maybe all time, but this is his cue.

“Be right back,” he says, patting Eddie’s thigh as he stands. 

“Where are you going?” Eddie asks suspiciously, pouting at the loss of Richie to lean up against.

“Gotta take a shit,” Richie lies easily. It has the desired effect — Eddie makes a disgusted noise and shoves Richie away from him with his foot. As Richie rounds the couch to head for the hallway, he subtly drops his cell phone in Patty’s lap — all part of the plan. He makes eye contact with Bill from across the room, and Bill beams at him and gives him a fucking thumbs up. Richie makes a slashing motion across his throat. He swears his friends are absolutely useless, he’s never going to involve them in surprises again. 

While Cyndi Lauper croons the sort of corny shit that Richie used to listen to with an aching heart alone in his bedroom in middle school, Richie ducks into his and Eddie’s bedroom and retrieves a small velvet ring box from the back of his nightstand drawer. He weighs it in his hand, opening it to look at the smooth gold band inside. He lets out a slow, steadying breath. Back in the living room, the song is coming to an end. 

“Showtime,” Richie mutters to himself. He closes the ring box and creeps back into the hall, watching and waiting. 

When the song ends, Richie's own pre-recorded voice comes on. “Hey, it’s your beloved Trashmouth here. Before we get back to the music, I asked Paul to play this little message. I’ve got a fun story for you.”

From his hidden vantage point in the hallway, Richie can see Eddie shift on the couch, turning around like he’s looking for Richie, before he turns back, leaning forward to listen. 

“If you’ve been a loyal listener since I first started on this show — well first of all, fix your goddamn sleep schedules, you shouldn’t still be staying up this late, it’s been fifteen years — but you might remember when I used to end all my radio broadcasts asking for a guy named Eddie to call the station. Well I’ve got _ great _news for you — he called! Like fifteen years ago, I should say, sorry I never filled you guys in. Yeah, we reconnected, and it turns out, he’s the love of my life. And tonight, I’m gonna ask him to marry me.”

Eddie’s spine straightens, and he whirls around, wide-eyed, to look for Richie again. He opens his mouth like he’s about to say something, maybe call for Richie, but instead he just turns back to the radio. Richie swallows around the emotions building in his throat. 

“He told me a year and a half ago that he wanted some romance for this moment, and I thought, hey, what’s more romantic than this? Eds, I hope you’re sufficiently wooed.” The Richie on the recording chuckles. “And a message to myself, since I’m probably crapping my pants right about now: get on with it already, stupid. You know what he’s going to say.” 

The recording ends. As the first piano notes of [“The Promise”](https://open.spotify.com/track/48p5E25cFPanxuwCTmTpuL?si=tmQdmZEZQWGbHiRTQjl6vQ) start to play, Richie finally comes out of hiding and steps back into the living room. He takes a deep breath and rounds the couch so he’s in front of Eddie, and drops down onto one knee. A quick glance around confirms that Patty is filming using Richie’s phone, and Bill and Mike are filming, too. Richie turns back to Eddie and pulls out the ring box.

Eddie has his hands over his mouth, and he’s already teary-eyed. “You sneaky fucker,” he says, laughing wetly. 

“Shut up, I’ve only got three minutes to say this,” Richie says. He hears someone, he thinks maybe Ben, chuckle, and it makes him smile. “Eddie, from the moment I met you, I loved you, and I mean that both times — when we were kids and when I found you again. Even the years when I couldn’t remember who you were, I loved you. You make me so fucking happy, Eds, every single day. I’m happier, and I’m — I’m _ better, _ because of you. You make me better. I know you think you’re… difficult, sometimes, but Eddie, you are so goddamn easy to love.” He has to stop for a moment, voice too choked with emotion to speak, and Eddie reaches out to grab his hand. Richie squeezes it like it’s the only thing grounding him; sometimes it feels like it really is. “Loving you is the easiest thing I’ll ever do, and I’m so lucky that I _ get _ to, and I want to keep doing it as long as you’ll let me. So, I know this is like, fucking overdue and everything, I’m just gonna ask now: Eddie Kaspbrak, will you marry me?”

He’s barely gotten the last syllable out before Eddie is grabbing him, practically pulling him into his lap so he can kiss him, hard and off-center and messy. “Yeah,” Eddie says when they part. “Obviously, _ obviously _yes.” 

Everyone starts cheering and applauding, and Richie clings to Eddie and half-laughs, half-weeps against his shoulder for a second before pulling back so he can kiss him again. “Fuck, I gotta put the ring on you,” he says. The song’s ending as he slides the ring onto Eddie’s finger, and he hears Patty snapping a pic. He knows she’s texting it to Paul, as instructed. 

Paul’s voice comes through the radio a moment later. “For the folks listening at home, I just got confirmation that Eddie said yes. Good thing, otherwise this next song would’ve been pretty awkward. Congrats, fellas!” 

The next song starts: [Belinda Carlisle](https://open.spotify.com/track/58mFu3oIpBa0HLNeJIxsw3?si=cbZMOkqPSrGTGSrWxLGrog) belts out, _ “Ooh baby, do you know what that’s worth? Ooh, heaven is a place on earth!” _ and Eddie starts laughing again, burying his face against Richie’s neck.

“I just want to say,” Richie says, looking around at everyone from his spot crouching in front of the couch, “that we wanted to wait to do this until we were all together again, and I. I’m just so glad you’re all here.”

“Oh, you fucking sap,” Beverly says, wiping at her eyes before getting up from her armchair to hug Richie and Eddie at the same time. Ben joins her, and before long Richie and Eddie are at the center of a giant group hug, everyone sniffling and laughing as Belinda Carlisle sings about how _ in this world we're just beginning to understand the miracle of living. _With everyone he loves around him and the man he defied an alien clown’s evil plans to find again hugged tight in his arms, Richie thinks he’s never heard truer words.

Some time later, Richie and Eddie are curled up in an armchair, their friends speaking softly over glasses of champagne, some top 40 music playing from the radio now. Richie’s fingers are tangled with Eddie’s, and he keeps bringing Eddie’s left ring finger to his lips, kissing the metal band. Eddie’s other hand combs idly through Richie’s hair. 

“You know, what you said earlier,” Eddie says quietly, and Richie tilts his head to make eye contact with him. “About me having no idea? I feel like that too. I can say I love you every day for the rest of our lives and it won’t be enough. You… you _ found _me, Rich, with that goddamn radio show. I’ll never get over that.” 

Richie smiles. “I did.” He pauses, then admits something he’s never told Eddie before. “When I first found that photo, when I started sort of remembering… I was gonna just give up and stop trying, but I couldn’t get your name out of my head. _ Just _ yours.”

“Guess your subconscious is pretty obsessed with me,” Eddie says.

“You’ve always been priority numero uno, even when I didn’t know it.” He feels himself tearing up, which has been happening on and off all night, so he just lets it happen. “It’s weird remembering everything now. Like, thirteen-year-old Richie would’ve lost his fucking mind if he knew this was waiting for him. I loved you so much back then, Eds, and I never thought —” 

“I know,” Eddie says softly. “Me too, remember? Me too.” He tips forward, pressing their foreheads together. Richie closes his eyes. Tomorrow is New Year’s Eve, and at midnight he’ll get to kiss his _ fiancé. _His life is fucking insane.

Patty says, “Hey, I’ve got an idea. Everyone get together on the couch, let me take a picture of the seven of you.” She pulls out her phone.

“We’ve gotta commemorate the Losers Club’s first clown-free reunion,” Richie agrees, as Eddie disentangles himself from Richie’s lap. Bill slaps Richie upside the head as they all shuffle around to cram onto the couch. 

As Richie slings an arm around Eddie’s shoulders, he realizes they’ve all fallen into the same order they’d been standing in the polaroid, the one that’s now hanging on his and Eddie’s fridge. He’s not even sure if they all did it on purpose. Either way, his smile is just as wide now as it was then, and he sends a little mental high five to the kid he was at thirteen, and the lonely young man he was at twenty-five, when he’d first uncovered the photo again. _ Took a little while, but we figured it out, _ he thinks to his past selves. _ We fucking made it. _

Richie grins, and the camera clicks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> and that's a wrap! i'm very emotional and will now cry for 100 hours! i definitely don't want to be done with this 'verse, so i might write some offshoots with scenes from throughout the years that didn't make it to the fic, or maybe the wedding? let me know if there's anything you'd like to see! i've added this to a series, so feel free to subscribe to that if you wanna keep up with it in the future. :) 
> 
> as always, comments are deeply appreciated, i love to hear what you guys liked!! find me on twitter @hermanngottiieb or tumblr @joshuawashinton for more reddie content. 
> 
> thank you again!!! byeeee <333


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